Redefined
by lolitarun
Summary: Blaine is forced to redefine his entire identity after one of the most important things in his life is taken away from him.
1. Prologue

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: I know, I know… I should NOT be starting another fic. But this idea just came to me, and I have a long weekend. "Broken" is definitely going to keep going; I was actually writing this prologue simultaneously with chapter 19. My story about Sam, however, I'm not so sure about – the idea's just sort of died for that one, and I'm not sure where I want to take it or if I even want to deal with that idea anymore. I may just stop writing it and come back later when I get some more ideas.**

Waking up on the ground was never a good sign. Usually it just meant that he had been sleepwalking again or occasionally that he'd fallen out of the bed, although the latter was usually preceded by a nightmare that Blaine had no desire to remember.

But this was different. This wasn't the carpet of his bedroom at home, nor was it the marble or hardwood floors of Dalton. This was cold and rough, and Blaine felt the material scraping off bits of skin as he moved his hand in an attempt to pick himself up off the ground. As soon as his weight shifted onto his left arm, Blaine felt pain shooting through the arm and across his chest. He thought he cried out, but he wasn't completely sure because he didn't hear it. He didn't actually hear anything, and if it hadn't been for the fact that Blaine was quickly becoming aware of how much of his body actually hurt, he might have been concerned over that fact.

Blaine wasn't sure how long it was before he actually opened his eyes; at times it felt as though he was drifting in and out of consciousness as he tried not to shiver in the cold for fear that it would send pain shooting through his body again.

It was light out, and Blaine finally saw that he was lying on a stretch of asphalt. His vision was off; Blaine didn't have the best vision, but normally he could at least see enough to know where he was. All he could see was an expanse of more asphalt, with the grass on the far side just a brownish green smudge occasionally broken by what he could only assume were bushes and the occasional tree.

Blaine felt his eyes getting heavy, exhaustion setting in from out of nowhere despite the fact that he had just woken up. As he drifted off again, Blaine could have sworn he felt a hand pushing the hair out of his face and finger pressing into the soft side of his neck to check for a pulse.


	2. Sirens

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: I know many of you probably want to kill me right now, which is why I didn't upload this story until I had a few chapters written. It's going to be a little while before Blaine's perspective pops up again for obvious reasons. First let's find out what's going on at Dalton, shall we?**

Kurt had woken up to the sound of sirens not far from his dorm room, like most of the boys at Dalton. Everyone had gone to the windows when the sirens didn't disappear quickly and had been surprised to find that there were all sorts of emergency vehicles stopped near the gates. It was far enough away that no one could tell what was going on, and the prefects had all been told not to let anyone outside. Almost everyone had wandered down to the various common rooms on the lower floors, waiting for someone from the administration to come tell everyone what was going on.

What worried Kurt the most was the fact that he hadn't seen Blaine since the night before. The older boy had left campus to go out to eat with his family because it was his sister Claire's birthday, and now Kurt couldn't get Blaine to respond to his text messages or answer his phone.

"I'm not getting an answer, either… and it's not going straight to voicemail, so I know his phone is on," David said, coming over to sit down next to Kurt. Wes was a prefect, so he was busy helping the staff members who lived on campus with the students keep everyone inside.

"Is anyone else missing or is it just Blaine?" Kurt asked.

"Jeff's not here, but Nick talked to him right after they turned off the sirens. There are a couple of underclassmen gone, but from what I can find out they were all seen leaving campus with their parents yesterday afternoon." Kurt bit his lip, the bad feeling in the pit of his stomach getting worse the longer he waited without hearing anything. He glanced at the phone in David's hand as it started ringing, playing a song that Kurt didn't recognize. "That's Blaine's brother…" David began, before he stood up and walked off to answer the phone call.

Kurt looked up as he heard the familiar squeaking noise of the headmaster's shoe on the wooden floor. He saw that there were several members of the staff and the prefects following him, all ushering more students into the senior commons.

"Boys, I need to speak with you." Kurt watched as everyone instantly shut up and looked at the headmaster. As he caught a glimpse of David's face, Kurt had a feeling that he knew what was coming. "This morning a groundskeeper found Blaine Anderson lying on the driveway leading to campus. It appears that he was beaten pretty severely… we don't have any details yet, but Blaine has been taken to the hospital. The police are asking for any student who may have information to come forward immediately." Kurt closed his eyes, letting his forehead rest on the heel of his hand.

"Sir… is he going to be okay?" Kurt looked up as he heard Wes speak up.

"I don't know. All I've been told is that he was unresponsive when he was found."

"But he was alive, right?" Nick asked.

"Yes. I don't know when we'll have any more details. We are requesting that you all stay on in the building until further notice; the police are still looking for any evidence that might be available."

"Why can't we go outside? It's just down by the gate, isn't it?" Kurt didn't know who asked the question, but he was wondering the same thing.

"Blaine's car is in its parking spot. As of right now the police don't know when or where he was actually attacked. Like I said before, if any of you have any information about what may have happened last night the police are asking that you come forward immediately." Kurt watched for a moment as the headmaster started to walk back out of the room, before he stood up and started out of the room, followed shortly by Wes and David.

"Headmaster Collins…" David called. Kurt watched as the older boy slid his cell phone back into his pocket. The three watched as the older man turned around.

"Boys, I know that you're friends with Blaine, but I can't allow you to leave campus to go check on him."

"We know that… but Blaine was with us right before he left campus yesterday," Wes replied.

"And his brother said he made it to dinner last night," David added.

"He texted me, saying he was going to be back late… he said it would probably be around one, but that he had to stop for gas so he might be a little later than that." Kurt fumbled with his phone in his pocket as he passed on that piece of information, searching through his messages in an attempt to find it.

"Do you know why he was coming back so late? That's unusual…"

"We have a paper due in French on Monday that he was having trouble with. He was coming back so that he could work on it the rest of the weekend," Kurt replied, suddenly reminded of his own unfinished paper. He watched in silence as the headmaster nodded.

"I'll need you boys to tell the police what you know, of course. I don't know how much good it will do, but anything is better than what they have now. Come with me."

* * *

Kurt had never been questioned by the police before, and the thorough interrogation he went through in the presence of the headmaster certainly would have impressed even one Sue Sylvester. There really wasn't much that Kurt could tell them beyond what he had told the headmaster already, and he'd spent most of the thirty minutes or so he had been talking to them admitting just how little he actually knew about Blaine's life outside of Dalton.

"I thought Sue Sylvester was intense… that was even worse than being stuck in the principal's office with Karofsky," Kurt muttered, slumping into a chair next to David outside the headmaster's office. He had been the last of the three to go through the interrogation process.

"I can't believe this is happening… _here_ of all places. This is supposed to be a safe place." Kurt bit his lower lip again at Wes's words, which were very similar to what Kurt had already been thinking.

"I just want to know what happened… who did this to him."

Kurt watched as the police officers left the headmaster's office, walking past them without a second look. He shook his head and sighed before standing up. "I think I'm going to go try to work on that French paper. At least until we're allowed off campus." He started to walk away from the other two.

"When we can… you want to go, don't you?" David asked. Kurt stopped and turned around to face the two older boys.

"Do you really need to ask that question?"

"I'll get what details I can from Alex and Daniel." Kurt raised an eyebrow as David spoke of two people that Kurt had never heard of before. "Alex is Blaine's older brother… he and my cousin Daniel are suitemates at Harvard."

"You said you got a call from Alex earlier… what did he say?"

"That he couldn't get Blaine on the phone… I told him what was going on here, and he said he was going to call his mom," David replied. "He texted me a while ago saying he was on his way to Ohio and that he'd left what details he had with Daniel. I was waiting to call, because Daniel was driving Alex to the airport."

"I'm guessing it probably hasn't been long enough to be able to call him, has it?" Kurt asked.

"I don't know… I'm not sure how long it takes to drive to the airport and back or even when they actually left." David pulled out his phone, glancing down at the time. "Maybe we should call before we eat lunch… I'm sure he can put it on speakerphone or something." Kurt watched as the senior put his own phone on speaker and dialed a number.

"_Shit, David… it's bad._" Kurt bit down on his bottom lip, walking closer so that he could hear the whole story of what was going on. "_Alex's mom said Blaine's in surgery right now._"

"Did she say what's wrong?"

"_His left arm's broken in a couple of places – that's what they're operating on right now. His collarbone's fractured, too, and some of his ribs. His right leg's also apparently a mess, but they can't operate on it yet for some reason. I don't know about his internal injuries… I didn't hear everything because I was trying to help Alex pack._"

"God… is there anything else you remember? We're on lockdown here, we can't get out to go see him."

"_Sorry, David… it was all kinds of crazy this morning. I wish I could tell you something more._" Kurt sighed as David finished the conversation, walking away from the other two. From what David's cousin had said, it sounded like Blaine had been through hell. Kurt just kept walking, moving back towards the common room where most of the other boys on campus were still hanging around. Someone had pulled a TV out of a classroom and had turned it to a local station. It was a little after noon, and the news was on.

"… _A groundskeeper at the school found the student, whose identity is not being released, unconscious near the gates of the Dalton campus early this morning. The boy is currently listed as being in critical condition. Police are currently looking for leads regarding the attack…_"

Kurt turned and walked out of the room, doing his best to get away from the television and all of the other students who were doing everything they could to get information about Blaine.

Kurt's dorm room was unusually silent, mostly because everyone else in the school was downstairs waiting to hear about Blaine. He sat down at his desk, trying to focus on the French assignment that he needed to finish before Monday. There was nothing else he could do; until the school administrators were willing to let them out of the building, Kurt knew that the best thing would be to keep himself busy so that he wouldn't have to think about what might be happening at the hospital.


	3. The Waiting Game

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: For a story that's only about 12 hours old, this one has certainly gotten quite a response! Nothing like "Broken," but still pretty impressive. So I'm going to give you all a little more of the story, this time from Alex's perspective.**

Alex Anderson hated the hospital waiting room he was currently stuck in; the walls were a sickly looking green, and the couches and chairs were uncomfortable from all of the abuse they had taken. Even the potted plants looked unhappy.

Alex set down one of the two cups of coffee he was carrying on the table next to his mother's chair, before he sat down on one of the couches next to his little sister and began sipping his own cup. He passed it to Claire for a moment, letting the fifteen year old take a few sips before he took it back. The room had been silent for a while, mostly because the Andersons were all fairly exhausted. Alex was the only member of the family who had really gotten any sleep, given the fact that he was the only one who hadn't been at Claire's birthday dinner the night before and therefore the only one who hadn't known that Blaine hadn't called when he got back to Dalton.

Blaine was out of surgery, but they were still waiting for the doctor to come talk to them. Alex had only been there for twenty minutes or so and he had spent most of that time downstairs getting coffee for his parents. He'd left the third cup down the hall, where his father was talking on the phone by one of the windows. Alex had a feeling that it was one of the nurses from his father's office and that the older man was trying to rearrange everything so that he wouldn't have to go into the office much while Blaine was in the hospital.

"Mrs. Anderson?" Alex looked up as he heard a voice from the doorway. "I'm sure you've already been told Blaine is out of surgery… they're moving him into the intensive care unit as we speak."

"Is he okay? Is he awake?" Alex bit his lip at his mother's question. He wanted to know the answer just as much as his mother did, but he was also afraid to know.

"I'm afraid that it's still too early to tell. But no, he isn't awake yet. We're keeping him in a drug-induced coma for the time being, giving his body time to heal. We managed to stop the internal bleeding and the bones in his arm have been pinned back together. He did fairly well in surgery, given his condition, but he's far from being out of the woods just yet."

"When can we see him?" Alex pulled his little sister closer as she asked the question; he knew she was afraid of what she might see, but that she wanted to be with Blaine. Claire had always been closer to Blaine than Alex for various reasons, and Alex knew that this waiting was probably hardest on her.

"As soon as he's settled I'll have a nurse come for you. I have to ask that only one or two of you go in at a time, and only family for now. He's still on the ventilator for now, mostly because the medication is depressing his respiratory system. When we bring him out of the coma we should be able to take him off the ventilator, but it could still be a few days before that happens." Alex looked up as the doctor sighed, running a hand through his own hair. "I wish I could give you all better news. Blaine's lucky to have made it this far, and at this point all we can do is wait."

"Thank you, doctor." Alex turned his attention to Claire as the doctor made his way out of the room, pulling his younger sister into a hug as she started to cry.

"Shh… he's alive. You know Blaine; he's stubborn. He'll pull through this."

"It's my fault… I begged him to stay out with us last night for my birthday. If I'd just let him go back to school…" Claire sobbed.

"Sweetie, you had no idea that this would happen. You couldn't have known, and you couldn't have stopped this from happening. We don't even know how this happened or who did it yet." Alex kissed the top of Claire's head, messing with her curly ponytail in an attempt at making her smile. He pulled out his phone and shot a quick text message to David to let his brother's friend know what was going on.

_Out of surgery, but still in a coma. They're not letting in visitors other than family right now, though_.

"Are you Blaine Anderson's family?" Alex looked up at the voice that interrupted the few moments of silence that had invaded the small waiting room. They had all been lost in their own thoughts until the nurse showed up. "I can take two of you to see him… Dr. Bern insisted on that limit."

"You two go ahead… I'll stay here and let your dad know what's going on when he gets done on the phone." Alex just nodded, standing up and helping Claire onto her feet. He kept an arm around his baby sister's shoulders the whole time they were walking. Alex stopped as he felt his phone vibrating, pulling it out of his pocket.

"You'll have to turn that off before you can go in… we don't allow cell phones in the ICU." Alex just nodded, checking the message quickly.

_We're still on lockdown anyway. No one's allowed to leave without a parent signing them out for the rest of the weekend. Keep us updated_.

Alex turned off the phone as soon as he was done reading the message; he'd be able to tell David more after he'd seen his brother. There wasn't a whole lot that had changed since the message he'd left with Daniel, and Alex wanted to actually talk to David and see if the Dalton boys had found out anything more since he had spoken to him that morning.

As soon as the phone was back in his pocket, the nurse proceeded to type a code into the door lock. "You'll have to press the call button by the door to get back in later, but you just have to tell them your name and who you're here to see. He's in the second room to your left." Alex just nodded as he walked into the rounded room, heading for the opening the nurse had mentioned. It was one of twelve or so that surrounded a nurse's station that seemed to be exceptionally busy, although surprisingly quiet.

Alex slowly pushed back the curtain that covered the doorway and let Claire through, watching as she slowly made her way closer to the bed that held their brother. Alex was shocked by how small his brother looked in the hospital bed, surrounded by machines that were working hard to keep the younger boy alive.

The case encasing Blaine's left arm and the tube that snaked its way into his mouth were the least surprising; Alex had been expecting that much. The IV line snaking into the side of his right arm wasn't much of a surprise either, given the fact that it was rather essential. Alex watched from the doorway as Claire's hands started tracing the wires that came out of the sleeve of Blaine's hospital gown back up to the heart monitor that was steadily beeping, proof that he was still alive.

There were bruises and contusions everywhere, covering every inch of visible skin on his brother's body. Alex could see that there was some kind of brace around Blaine's right leg, keeping it still, although he couldn't tell much through the blanket. He watched as Claire finally stopped tracing over the tubes and wires, taking Blaine's right hand between both of her own.

"He's so cold…"

"He'll warm up. They wouldn't let him get so cold if it would hurt him." Alex moved over towards the bed and ran a hand through his younger brother's hair, putting a hand on Claire's shoulder.

"He can't die; they can't let him die."

"He won't, Claire. The doctors are going to do everything they can for him. This is Blaine we're talking about – he's stubborn as hell. You remember when he didn't eat for a week because Mom and Dad refused to let him go to drama camp instead of going on our family vacation?" Alex looked down at Claire's face and saw the smile that formed through her tears.

"You think he's stubborn enough to survive this?"

"I think that our brother is going to be alive for a long, long time because he's too stubborn to give up."


	4. Awakening

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: Well, I haven't had as much of a response as I would like for this fic, but I'm going to continue because I really like this one and it's one of those weird things I can research to my heart's content (cause I'm a geek like that). Hope y'all enjoy!**

The heart monitor had been beeping steadily for two days, thankfully without ever stopping. It was a relief to Kurt every time he heard it beep, because that meant that Blaine was still alive. That the bastards who had attacked him hadn't succeeded in killing the boy that Kurt was so madly in love with. The ventilator was gone; the doctors had slowly weaned Blaine off the medication that forced him to remain unconscious and he'd been able to breathe on his own once its effects wore off. But Blaine had yet to open his eyes or give any indication that he was alive besides the heart monitor and the steady rise and fall of his chest.

"He's stubborn… doesn't give up for anything." Kurt looked away from Blaine for a moment, surprised by the face in front of him. He hadn't seen Blaine's brother yet, and the resemblance was striking. Alex appeared to look more like their mother, who had been born in the Philippines, but he and Blaine had the same dark curly hair and ridiculous triangle-shaped eyebrows. Even their physicality was similar, with the two only being an inch or so apart in height and almost identically built.

"Do you think it'll be enough?"

"I have to hope it will be." Kurt turned back to watch Blaine as he slept, crossing his arms. "He talked about you… all the time. Too much for you to be just a friend, despite what Wes and David told my parents."

"But I am just a friend. We never talked about it…" Kurt began.

"He wants something more. I know my brother." Kurt felt tears begin to sting his eyes as the older boy spoke.

"Sorry… do we really have to talk about this? I'm… I'm just not really comfortable talking about this with someone I don't know."

"I understand. Sorry if I made you uncomfortable." Kurt felt Alex put a hand on his shoulder for a moment. "He's a strong kid. He just needs some time." Kurt didn't look away from Blaine, even as Alex finally moved his hand away from Kurt's shoulder and started to move away. Kurt heard the curtain covering the doorway move, signaling that Alex had left the room.

Kurt moved his hands, taking Blaine's free hand in one of his and using his other hand to run his fingers through the older boy's mess of curly hair for a moment before he pulled away and started to leave the room.

A groan stopped him. Kurt turned around as soon as he heard the sound, knowing better than to hope that it was Blaine starting to wake up, yet at the same time praying that the older boy really was coming back to him. "Blaine?" Kurt watched from the doorway as Blaine's eyes slowly fluttered open. He watched in silence as Blaine reached up with his right hand, rubbing his eyes for a moment. "Blaine?"

Kurt was disturbed by the fact that Blaine didn't respond at all. He moved back towards the bed, reaching out to touch Blaine's hand. Before he even realized what was happening, Blaine had grabbed him by the wrist and was squeezing it. He could hear that the heart monitor had quickened its pace. Blaine seemed to recognize Kurt's face and he started to loosen his grip. "I'm… I'm sorry. You scared me." Blaine's eyes closed again and Kurt could tell that he was trying to calm himself down.

"It's okay… it's fine. Just relax." Kurt pushed the older boy's hair out of his face again, brushing the curls away so that they wouldn't end up in Blaine's eyes. He'd let his hair grow out a good bit since Kurt had come to Dalton, letting it curl freely more often since Kurt had commented on how good it looked.

"Why won't you say anything?" Kurt squeezed Blaine's hand, confused by the older boy's question.

"What are you talking about?"

"Please just say something… just talk to me." Kurt watched as Blaine opened his eyes, looking at him. "Why aren't you saying anything?"

"Blaine, I'm talking to you right now…" Kurt watched as confusion spread over the older boy's face and the heart monitor sped up again. Blaine had obviously realized that something was wrong.

"I can't hear you… I can't hear what you're saying. Why?" Kurt shook his head, not knowing how to answer. It wouldn't have mattered much anyway, given the fact that Blaine wouldn't know what he was saying. "Wh… where's my mom? Can you find her?" Kurt just nodded, squeezing the older boy's hand briefly before he pulled away. He wasn't sure why he was nervous; Blaine was awake and Kurt should have been happy. But the boy's first words after he woke up had Kurt concerned and upset.

A nurse walked into the room as Kurt was leaving it, saving him the trouble of stopping at the nurse's station to tell them what was going on. It didn't make the fact that Kurt had to tell Blaine's mother what was going on any easier. He couldn't leave out that fact; Mrs. Anderson needed to know what was going on with her son.

Kurt made his way down the hall, stopping just inside the door of the waiting room where Blaine's mother was waiting.

"H…he's awake. He asked me to find you. He… he couldn't hear me." Kurt watched as Blaine's mother rushed out of the room, ignoring the questioning looks that came from the other members of the Anderson family and the two other Warblers who had shown up with him.

"What do you mean?" Kurt turned as he heard David's voice. "Kurt, what's going on?" There was no way Kurt could keep the tears from sliding down his face.

"He woke up and he was talking to me, but he didn't even know I was talking back to him, not until he could see me talking to him. I… I think he realized something was wrong. He just wanted his mom…" Kurt watched as Mr. Anderson hurried out of the room, followed closely by Blaine's siblings. He sat down on the ridiculously uncomfortable couch letting his head rest against his right hand, closing his eyes.

"Maybe it's temporary…"

"What if it isn't? What if he's… what if it's permanent?" Kurt couldn't even bring himself to say the word that he was thinking. _Deaf_.

"I don't know. It'll get figured out – Blaine's family will do whatever they need to do to help him," Wes replied, sitting down and putting an arm around Kurt's shoulders.

"It's getting late… we need to get back to school before curfew." Kurt nodded, letting Wes and David force him to his feet and out of the waiting room towards the elevator. He had too much on his mind to really pay attention to what was going on around him.

"…need to figure out what we're going to do about Regionals." Kurt looked up as he heard Wes and David start discussing Warblers business.

"Are we really going to talk about all of that while we're still at the hospital?" Kurt asked.

"Sorry. We just… we have to be prepared. Blaine's not going to be back in time for Regionals, no matter what happens at this point." Kurt leaned back against the wall of the elevator, closing his eyes and letting the tears that he'd been holding back slide down his face. He wasn't sure why, but something in the pit of his stomach told Kurt that even once Blaine healed, things would never be the same again.


	5. Silence

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: Sorry it took so long to get another chapter up; I've got three stories that I'm working on simultaneously right now, plus school on top of that keeping me super busy. This chapter wasn't easy to write, because I had to figure out a way to write conversation when one of the parties couldn't hear what was going on… it's not easy.**

Blaine wasn't sure what was going on around him. He picked up on the obvious things, like the fact that he was in the hospital. Blaine didn't remember how he'd ended up there, but he knew that when he was awake it seemed like pain radiated through his entire body. There was a reason Blaine preferred to be asleep.

Being awake also meant that people tried to talk to him, which only served to confuse and frustrate Blaine even more than the fact that he couldn't remember how he'd gotten there. Blaine knew that people were trying to talk to him; he could see that their lips were moving and that they were watching him, expecting him to answer. He tried to talk to them, to say something and let them know that he had no idea what they were saying. One of the doctors had put a pair of headphones on him at one point, and eventually Blaine had started to hear a beeping noise. He'd tried to say as much, but he couldn't be sure that they'd heard him. He couldn't even hear his own voice; the only reason he knew that any words had actually come out was because he could feel the vibrations.

There were people coming in and out of the room all the time, faces Blaine recognized but just couldn't place. There weren't any names, but Blaine knew that the boys in the navy blazers were important. Especially the tall, pale boy with perfect skin. He was there more than the other two boys, although they all seemed to show up together.

The only names that ever came were his family. They were there constantly – almost every time he woke up, one of his parents or siblings were there, sitting in silence with him. Alex had been there at first, but Blaine hadn't seen him in a while. He didn't know how long he'd been awake, how many days he'd been there. Time didn't mean anything, because the painkillers they gave him kept him drifting in and out of consciousness so much that he couldn't keep track of anything. What little time he spent awake ran together in a murky haze that Blaine couldn't ever quite decipher. He tried, but every attempt he made at trying to sort things out just made his head ache even more than it had been aching the entire time he had been in the hospital.

Blaine opened his eyes as he felt someone take his hand, smiling at the mass of curls that he instantly recognized as his sister. "Hey Claire." Blaine watched as his sister turned and smiled at him, before she held up a finger to tell him to wait a minute. She pulled out dry erase board and a marker, uncapping the marker and starting to write.

_**Aren't you glad I thought of this?**_

"You're brilliant, Cee." Blaine wasn't really sure why no one else had come up with the same idea. He could read; his vision was still off, but as long as it wasn't too far away Blaine could read the things around him.

_**Thank you. How are you feeling?**_

"Confused. How long have I been here?"

_**Six days. But you've only been awake for two**_.

Blaine closed his eyes for a moment, processing the information. Whatever had happened to him had left him unconscious for four days. "What happened?" Blaine watched as the look on Claire's face changed as she was writing her answer.

_**You were attacked. Beaten. Don't know why.**_

"Why can't I hear you? What's wrong with me?"

_**They don't know yet. Need to do more tests.**_

Blaine closed his eyes, shaking his head slightly. He wasn't sure how he felt about that yet, because that also meant they didn't know whether it was permanent or not. It wasn't until Claire squeezed his hand that Blaine opened his eyes again.

_**It's bad. Almost profound. I wasn't supposed to tell you. **_

"I want to know… I have a right to know."

_**They just don't want to scare you… you freaked out at first. Remember?**_

Blaine shook his head again. Whatever they'd given him to make him calm down had messed with his ability to remember what had happened, because he couldn't even remember how he'd originally realized that he couldn't hear what people were saying. Even trying to remember all of the things that he couldn't remember was starting to make Blaine's head ache from thinking too much.

A nurse walked into the room at that point with a tray of food, placing it on the table and pushing it in front of Blaine. That was a first, as far as Blaine knew; he didn't remember having food before. He watched in silence as Claire opened the plastic silverware and started getting the food ready for him to actually eat it. He was lucky she thought of the fact that he only had use of one arm and wouldn't be able to get into it himself.

His hand was clumsy as he took the spoon from her hand, doing his best to spoon some of the soup into his mouth. Blaine couldn't stop the shaking as he started bringing it up to his face, spilling a large portion of the warm liquid as he went. He dropped the spoon back onto the tray, sighing and closing his eyes. "I can't even feed myself…" he muttered. He felt Claire squeezing his hand again and opened his eyes.

Claire had the spoon in her hand, holding it for him. "No… no way." Blaine shook his head, reaching up to push Claire's hand away. She put the spoon down in the bowl and picked up the dry erase board again.

_**You have to eat. I can help you.**_

"You shouldn't have to… I'm seventeen years old, I should be able to take care of myself." Blaine watched as Claire started writing frantically.

_**You're hurt, Blaine. **__**Really**__** hurt. Just let me help you.**_

Blaine tried to pick up the spoon again, stopping as he realized that his hand was going to shake no matter what he did. He wanted to eat – he was hungry and he knew that he would have to be able to eat before he'd be allowed out of the hospital. "Fine. Just this once." Blaine was willing to give in, just this once, because he wanted to get out of the hospital – the one thing Blaine wanted more than anything was to go home.

Claire took the spoon out of Blaine's hand, filling it with soup and lifting it to Blaine's mouth for him. She actually managed to get all of its contents into his mouth on the first try. They sat like that for a while, Claire spooning the warm liquid into his mouth over and over again until the bowl was empty. Blaine took Claire's hand as she started to fill it with something else, shaking his head. "I'm not that hungry."

Blaine looked up as his mother walked into the room, moving towards him. She and Claire spoke for a minute as Blaine watched; he tried to watch their lips and figure out what they were saying, but he didn't understand enough to figure out what was being said. "Please don't do that… I can't understand you." Blaine watched as his mother turned and smiled at him, picking up the whiteboard and scribbling out a message on it.

_**Your father's taking Claire home, to go back to school. But I'm going to stay with you.**_

Blaine nodded, closing his eyes. Even if he didn't know what day it was, he knew that Claire needed to be back at school. She was missing too much by being at the hospital with him all the time; they were all missing too much of their lives because he was in the hospital. He opened his eyes again as Claire let go of his hand, reaching up and pulling her into a hug – or at least the closest approximation of a hug that he could give with only one arm and several broken ribs. He watched as his sister left, before he said anything else to his mother.

"What did the doctor say?" Blaine watched as his mother cleared the board and started writing again.

_**They're going to run some more tests today, see if they can figure out what's wrong.**_

Blaine nodded at that; it was basically what Claire had told him before. But his mother seemed to be writing something else, hopefully adding to the information.

_**But they're going to move you to a regular room this afternoon. You're getting better.**_

Blaine tried to shift his weight in the bed to get more comfortable, wincing at the pain that shot through various parts of his body as he moved. He wasn't sure how long it really was, but it seemed like a nurse was there almost instantly with a shot of pain medication in his IV. It only took a few minutes for it to dull the pain, and it wasn't long after that before he was slipping off to sleep under its influence.


	6. Questioning

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So this chapter was SO much easier to write than the last one. I wasn't really planning on having Burt in this story, but it was necessary for what I wanted to do in this chapter… and then it turned into a cute moment, so it worked out perfectly.**

Kurt was having a hell of a time concentrating in his classes; his school subjects seemed unimportant in the light of everything that had happened in the previous week. He assumed that was why he had been called to the headmaster's office at first, before he ran into his father outside the office.

"Dad… what are you doing here?"

"Mr. Collins called me… said I needed to come down here. Something about the police wanting to talk to you…" Kurt nodded, knowing that he probably looked as though his eyes were about to pop out of his head. "Do you have any idea why they might want to talk to you?"

"Not really… maybe something about Blaine," Kurt replied. He saw the look of confusion on his father's face and sighed. "Someone attacked him Friday night as he was coming back from having dinner with his family. He doesn't know what happened."

"What do you have to do with that, Kurt?"

"I was the last person who spoke to him… it was just a couple of texts, but still…"

"Mr. Hummel?" Kurt and his father both looked up at the sound of the voice coming from the headmaster's door. Kurt recognized him as one of the detectives he'd spoken to Saturday morning, but he didn't remember a name. "If the two of you would come in… this shouldn't take long."

Kurt and his father walked into the office, sitting down at the small table that sat in a corner for informal meetings; Kurt knew from the other boys that no one sat in the chairs in front of the desk unless they were in some kind of trouble.

"I want to know what's going on here… is my son in some kind of trouble?" Kurt closed his eyes at his father's question; he wanted to know the answer, but he wasn't sure that he wanted his father to ask so bluntly.

"No. We don't have any reason to believe that Kurt had anything to do with what happened to his classmate. But we think he might be able to help us figure out who did."

"Kurt, do you know of anyone who might have a reason to hurt Blaine?" Kurt looked over at the female detective, who had already been sitting at the table when he and his father entered the room. He bit his lip for a moment; he knew what he needed to do, but at the same time Kurt was afraid of what might happen.

"Kurt… what do you know?" He looked over at his father, sighing.

"Dave Karofsky. I… I told Blaine something about him. Something Karofsky didn't want anyone to know…" Kurt began, watching his father's face to see if the older man would figure out what he was going to say. Kurt loved his father, but Burt wasn't exactly quick on the uptake.

"Wait… you think that kid had something to do with this?" Burt asked.

"Mr. Hummel, please… let us ask the questions." Kurt was thankful that the male detective basically told his father not to interfere; it would only make things more difficult if his father was asking questions constantly. "Kurt, why would Dave Karofsky want to hurt Blaine? What secret was he keeping?"

Kurt shook his head for a moment. "Karofsky will know one of us told… no one else knew."

"Knew what?"

"That Dave Karofsky is… that he's gay." Kurt took a deep breath before he continued. "Dave threatened to kill me if I told anyone else… maybe he thought Blaine was going to say something."

"Would Dave have a letterman jacket?" the female detective asked. Kurt nodded.

"Yeah… he plays hockey and football at McKinley." Kurt watched as the detectives nodded, while the female detective opened a file folder and started pulling out pictures that looked as though they had come from a security camera.

"Anyone look familiar?"

The pictures were grainy and Kurt had a hard time figuring out what he was looking at other than the obvious fact that they were people and one of them was wearing a McKinley letterman jacket. But the boy's skin was the wrong color to be Dave Karofsky.

"That's a McKinley jacket, but that isn't Karofsky," Kurt replied, pointing at one of the figures. "I can't tell who any of them are, though… the pictures are too grainy."

"You're sure that isn't Dave Karofsky?" the male detective asked.

"Positive… wrong skin color." Kurt finally looked at the rest of the picture, taking in the fact that the three boys he had been studying pictures of were grabbing Blaine from his car in one of them. The others showed slightly different scenes, but in all of them at least one of the boys was holding Blaine, pulling his further and further away from his own vehicle. He closed his eyes, pushing the pictures away. Kurt didn't want to look at them any more; despite how grainy the pictures were, he felt sure that he could see the fear in Blaine's face.

"Any idea why someone else from McKinley might want to hurt Blaine?"

"No… I mean, there are several homophobes on the football team, but until now none of them have ever done worse than throwing a slushie or shoving someone into a locker. Never anything really serious," Kurt replied. "They're cruel, but I never thought any of them would do something like this."

"Thank you, Kurt… Mr. Hummel. We'll let you know if we need to speak to you again." Kurt nodded and stood up, following his father out of the room. He wasn't at all surprised when the man turned around shortly after they exited the room and crossed his arms.

"Dave Karofsky is gay?" Kurt nodded. "And he threatened to kill you because you knew?"

"Only if I told anyone. Besides Blaine – he knew before Dave threatened me."

"How did you even find out?" Kurt shook his head, sighing.

"Dad, please…"

"How did you find out, Kurt?"

"Dad…"

"How, Kurt?"

"He… he kissed me. I was pissed off and yelling at him, and he grabbed me and kissed me." Kurt crossed his own arms, sighing. "Blaine tried to help… he tried to talk to Karofsky, to help him figure out what he was feeling. But Dave's so far in the closet…" Kurt let his words trail off, hoping that his father had gotten the picture. Thankfully, Burt Hummel didn't feel the need to hear more about Dave Karofsky.

"How's Blaine?"

"He's still in the hospital. He was in a coma for a while… he woke up the day before yesterday. His mom said there's some brain damage on top of his physical injuries, but they're still trying to figure out how bad it is." Kurt purposely stopped himself before he said anything about the worst part of it.

"Have you gotten to see him?"

"Wes, David, and I have gone a few times. His mom is supposed to text Wes today and let him know if Blaine's up to having visitors… they were supposed to move him out of the ICU this morning."

Kurt was surprised as his father reached out and pulled him into a hug.

"You're a good kid, Kurt. I love you."

"I love you, too, Dad." Kurt was more than a little confused by his father's sudden outburst of affection. They weren't normally very affectionate, at least physically, and it was strange for his father to do something like that outside of their home. He was almost relieved when the older man stepped back.

"You should probably get back to class. Call when you have some time… Carole's about ready to beg you to come home for a weekend."

"Tell her I'll come next weekend. Things should be calm again by then." Kurt started back toward the classroom wing of the building, but stopped when he was only a few feet away, turning back to face his father. "I'm sorry. For not telling you the whole story about Karofsky. Or about any of this."

"No more secrets, okay?" Kurt nodded.

"No more secrets."


	7. Sound

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So yay, I managed to finish another chapter! I'm still working on the next chapter of "Broken" and I had an idea for another one-shot that I want to write up but things keep changing in my head so it's going to be a while. Anyway, hope you all enjoy!**

Being in the hospital was beginning to get tedious, even if Blaine had only known he was there for a few days. The only good thing about the situation was that they had moved him out of the ICU that morning and into a regular room, which meant that Blaine was able to at least get up and sit in a real chair rather than being stuck in bed all the time. It hurt, given the number of broken bones he had and the fact that he had to actually put some weight on his broken leg in order to walk the few steps. He still hadn't worked up the courage to look at his face in a mirror and see all of the bruises.

Blaine had gotten a good look at the fading bruises on his chest, arms, and legs, although he had a strong suspicion that the casts on his arm and leg covered the worst of it. There were so many; in some places Blaine wasn't sure where one bruise ended and the next began. It was sickening, which was part of the reason Blaine had begged to be allowed to wear pajamas instead of the awful hospital gown. At least his pajamas covered most of his skin, hiding as many of the black and blue marks as possible. Even if his mother did have to help him change clothes because he couldn't get into any of his clothes by himself.

Blaine felt a hand on his shoulder and turned away from the window he had been staring at, forcing a smile as he saw one of the countless doctors he had seen since he'd woken up in the hospital. He vaguely remembered him as the doctor who had tried to test his hearing; the proper term for the man's specialty escaped him.

Paying attention to what was being said wasn't exactly an easy task, so Blaine didn't even bother to try. He didn't know how to read lips, and the man wasn't bothering with the whiteboard Claire had brought him, which Blaine knew his mother had gotten when he'd been moved into this new room. Blaine was looking out the window again when he felt someone touching his shoulder again and turned to find the doctor kneeling down beside him with two small electronic devices in one of his hands that Blaine couldn't quite make out without his glasses. Somehow those still hadn't found their way to the hospital. Blaine watched as the man picked one of them up and showed it to Blaine before moving it towards Blaine's right ear. He felt the doctor gently press one of the ends into his ear, hooking it behind his ear.

It felt awkward, like the weird headphones Wes always used. Blaine had tried them once, but he hadn't liked the weird combination of earbuds and the glasses he had worn when he was in elementary school. But at least these seemed to fit his ear better and weren't nearly as annoying to get on. Blaine was distracted enough that he didn't even notice the doctor putting the other aid into his left ear until he turned the device on, slowly dialing up the volume.

The noises startled Blaine; he had gotten so used to silence that even the small amount of noise that he could hear felt strange and wrong. The fact that only bits and pieces of what was going on around him actually came through didn't help that feeling.

"Blaine, can you hear me?" The words were soft, barely audible over the strange background noise of the hospital. Blaine instantly turned to his mother, recognizing her voice despite how soft it seemed to be.

"Barely," Blaine replied, reaching up towards his right ear and attempting to find the volume control. "Can it get louder? It's too quiet…" He felt the doctor's hand on top of his, guiding his fingers to the small dial and helping him turn it the tiny bit further the dial could go.

"Better?" the doctor asked, making the same adjustment on the other ear. Blaine nodded slightly.

"A little. It's still really quiet." Blaine saw the man sigh, but he didn't hear it even with the hearing aids. They weren't strong enough.

"We can try a more powerful aid…" the doctor began. Blaine wasn't really paying attention to the conversation very well; it took too much effort to keep focusing on the quiet conversation and it was making Blaine's head ache.

Blaine didn't even notice the doctor leaving the room until his mother ran a hand through his hair. He turned and smiled at her slightly. "Where are my glasses? I'm tired of not being able to see anything." Blaine didn't like the way he couldn't really understand his own voice. It sounded strange and garbled, nothing like he remembered it sounding.

"I'll have Wes bring them today. Do you need anything else?"

"No… I'm just kind of tired. I think I'm going to try and sleep until the pain meds wear off again," Blaine replied, reaching up and finding the dial on his hearing aid to turn it off. There was no point in wasting the batteries, and at least a nap would be a good excuse for taking them off. Blaine pulled the device out of his ear, placing it in his mother's outstretched hand before he quickly did the same with the other one. Blaine closed his eyes, drifting off fairly quickly.

* * *

Finn looked up quickly as he heard Coach Beiste's whistle in the locker room, surprised to see a man and a woman in suits standing behind her. "Listen up! This is Detective Browning and Detective Mitchell from Westerville. They've asked to talk to all of you for a few minutes." Finn raised an eyebrow. He wasn't always the quickest one on the uptake, but he knew that Kurt was in Westerville.

"We have reason to believe that some of you may have information regarding one of our cases… a student from Dalton Academy was attacked several days ago…" the female detective began. Finn watched as Puck shot to his feet, staring down Karofsky as Sam and Mike held onto his arms. Dave didn't seem the least bit fazed by Puck's threatening stance.

"What did you do to him? What did you do to Kurt?"

"Puck!" Finn yelled, standing up and getting the other boy's attention. "Don't you think you would have heard about it before now if it was Kurt?"

"How do you know? Have you talked to him lately?"

"Puck, Finn's his stepbrother… he lives with Kurt's dad. I think he would know whether he'd spoken to Kurt or not," Sam reasoned. That seemed to be enough to calm Puck down, or at least to get him to sit back down on the bench to hear the rest.

"Finn's right… it wasn't Kurt Hummel who was attacked. We're here because the security cameras caught several images of the attackers… we can't make out faces, but one of the boys was wearing a McKinley High letterman jacket. If any of you have any information, we will be in Miss Pillsbury's office until five."

"What was his name?" Finn asked.

"We can't release that information. He's a minor and his parents have asked that we not give out any identifying details for privacy reasons," the male detective replied.

"Why do you even care, Hudson? She already said it wasn't your fag of a brother. What, you got him to set you up with a rich boyfriend over there?" Finn turned sharply and glared at Azimio. He was already on his feet before he remembered that it would be a bad idea to get into anything with the other boy in front of both their coach and the detectives.

"Azimio! You just earned yourself a hundred push-ups," Coach Beiste called. "Hudson, sit down or you'll be joining him." Finn followed orders, but only because hitting Azimio Adams wasn't worth the torture of having to do extra push-ups. It wouldn't stop the other boy from being a jerk, anyway. "Get out of here. Except for you, Adams."

Finn got up from the bench, going straight to his locker and pulling out his cell phone to find out what the hell was going on. Whatever had happened, Kurt was sure to know.


	8. Visiting

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So this got a little longer than I expected. But I really ended up liking how I ended this so it worked out well to be a little longer than normal. Enjoy!**

Kurt pulled his cell phone out of his pocket as it vibrated, sighing as he realized Finn was texting him.

_Cops were here. What happened? Who got hurt?_

Kurt sighed. He didn't want to explain everything to Finn; the other boy obviously knew at least part of what was going on given the fact that the police had paid a visit to Lima and Finn had heard something. Before Kurt could even respond, the phone vibrated again in his hand.

_If Karofsky had anything to do with it, we can kill him for you. Just say the word._

Kurt couldn't help but roll his eyes and smile at the second message; of course Finn's first thought would be that he and the other guys from McKinley's glee club would be able to take care of the problem by committing murder. He sighed as he realized that Wes had stopped his car in the hospital parking lot and that the two older boys were getting out of the car. Kurt typed out a response to Finn as quickly as possible.

_No idea if Dave was involved. Group of guys jumped Blaine in the parking lot Friday. He's still in the hospital._

As soon as he sent the text, Kurt followed Wes and David's lead into the hospital. Wes took the lead because Blaine's mother had given him the room number when she'd texted to tell him that it was okay for them to come visit. They were already in the elevator by the time Finn texted him back.

_Shit… sorry, man. Is he going to be okay?_

Kurt sighed, trying to decide how much he was going to tell his stepbrother.

"What's up?" Kurt looked up from the phone, noticing the concerned looks on Wes and David's faces.

"Finn heard about what happened… he wants details, and I have no idea what to tell him," Kurt replied. He looked back down at the phone, before he closed the text message screen as the elevator stopped on the correct floor.

"How much does he know already?"

"Not a lot… just that Blaine's still in the hospital. I'm not sure what I should tell him other than that." Kurt slid the phone into his pocket, deciding that it would be best for him to just wait a while before he responded. It would give him time to actually see how Blaine was doing and to think about what Finn really needed to know about what was going on at Dalton.

It wasn't far from the elevator and the lobby area to Blaine's new room; the door was already open when they got there, and David knocked on the door frame before they walked in.

"Come on in, boys. Blaine should be waking up soon." Kurt was surprised to see Blaine out of the bed, sleeping in the recliner by the window.

"We could come back…" David began.

"No, it won't be long. The pain medicine should wear off soon, and it's pretty much the only reason he's getting any sleep. Although I think the nap is mostly an excuse to take off the hearing aids."

"Are they working?" Wes asked. That was the big question at the moment; all three of the boys knew that Blaine's hearing loss was most likely permanent and that he was going to need some type of hearing aid for the rest of his life. But the look on Mrs. Anderson's face told them all that things weren't looking good.

"Not well. He says that everything is really quiet There are still more options to try, if Blaine will. But he doesn't really seem to want to wear them."

"I may not be able to hear you, but I know that you're talking about me." Kurt glanced over at the recliner, where Blaine was still sitting. At least he was smiling at them, even though Kurt could tell that he was in pain.

"Oh, hey… your glasses." Kurt turned to Wes as the older boy started digging around in the duffle bag that Kurt hadn't even noticed before and pulling out a glasses case and handing it over to Blaine's mother. She took them over to him, unfolding the arms so that Blaine would be able to put them on easily. Then she picked up what Kurt assumed were the hearing aids from the bedside table and handing them over.

"Can you get the nurse to bring me another pain pill? My leg hurts." Kurt moved further into the room as Blaine put on the glasses and the hearing aids. He could hear a strange noise that almost sounded like feedback for a moment as Blaine turned the devices on.

"Sure. I'll tell someone on my way down to get some dinner so that you boys can hang out for a while." The three boys in their Dalton uniforms made way for Mrs. Anderson to leave before they all moved towards the bed, closer to Blaine. Kurt and Wes ended up sitting on the side of the bed, with David leaning against the windowsill. There was a tense, awkward silence in the room, and Kurt was trying to figure out how to break it when Blaine finally spoke up.

"So… I need to ask you guys a really awkward question," Blaine began. "I know that you guys are my friends… I remember your faces, but I don't know your names. Then I have names that there aren't any faces to go with. And I don't know if any of them are supposed to go together or not." Kurt felt his heart drop at Blaine's words. He didn't remember Kurt – not really. And even though he and Blaine had chosen to just be friends, it hurt because Kurt still wanted to be something special to Blaine.

The looks on Wes and David's faces told Kurt that they hadn't been expecting the question any more than he had. Wes managed to pull himself back together first to answer the question.

"I'm Wes. That's David, and this is Kurt," the boy said, motioning to each of them in turn. Kurt watched as Blaine nodded, although he couldn't really respond given the fact that the nurse walked in with medication at that moment. Kurt, Wes, and David sat there awkwardly until she was gone, not sure if Blaine wanted to talk in front of the nurses.

"Can I ask you guys another awkward question?" Kurt raised an eyebrow, wondering what else Blaine wanted to ask them. "You guys know I'm gay, right? I'm not still in the closet, am I?" Kurt tried really hard not to laugh, but Wes and David weren't doing a very good job of hiding the fact that they found it amusing. "Is that a stupid question?"

"Kind of… Blaine, Wes and I have known you were gay pretty much the entire time we've known you," David replied.

"I guessed it the day we met," Kurt added. "Granted, I suspected that Wes and David were as well at the time."

"You actually came out to us like, a week after you finally started talking to us when you got to Dalton," Wes commented. Kurt felt awkward sitting in on this conversation, mostly because he wasn't sure what he was going to learn from Wes and David as they tried to help Blaine remember. He wasn't sure if Blaine would want him to know all of those things.

"So everyone knows…"

"Yeah. You were never flamboyant or anything, but you weren't afraid to admit who you are," Wes replied. They all watched Blaine for a moment, wondering where this line of questioning was going. Kurt wanted to walk over to Blaine and just wrap his arms around the older boy, but he wasn't sure if that was a good idea or not.

"Is that why this happened? Did someone get pissed off at me for being gay?"

"No one knows yet, Blaine. The police are still trying to figure out who did this to you." Kurt looked down at the floor; he hadn't said anything to Wes and David about his conversation with the police earlier that day, and he didn't really have any intention of bringing it up.

"They're probably going to come by here soon, try and talk to you and find out what you remember."

"I don't remember anything… I can't even remember parts of my life from before this happened," Blaine commented.

"No one really expects you to remember. No one was even sure you were going to make it," David replied with a sigh. "Just don't worry about it, okay? If you don't remember, then you don't remember. It's not that big a deal."

"It's not a big deal that I don't remember parts of my life?" Blaine sounded upset about that idea, and Kurt was thankful that Wes jumped in to save the conversation.

"That's not what David meant… it's just okay that you don't remember what happened to you." Kurt watched as Blaine just shook his head and started staring out the window. He didn't seem convinced that Wes was right.

"Can we go outside? I'm ready to get out of here." Kurt watched as Blaine put down the footrest of the recliner and started to get to his feet, grabbing a crutch that Kurt hadn't noticed before to help him balance without putting too much weight on his injured leg.

"I can ask the nurse… but are you sure you want to? It's really cold outside."

"Yeah, Wes… I'm sure. I just need to see something other than white walls for a while. I'm so sick of the hospital… they wouldn't even let me out of bed until this morning."

"I'm sure they had a good reason for that… but I'll go ask if you can go outside." Kurt bit his lip as Wes left the room.

"David, can you give us a minute? I want to talk to Kurt about something." David walked out of the room quickly, leaving Kurt alone with the older boy who was slowly hobbling over towards the bed as David left. "Kurt… is there something going on between us? Are we…?" Kurt sighed, shaking his head and smiling.

"We're friends. Just friends." Kurt watched as Blaine nodded briefly, then started to shake his head.

"Then why do I feel like I want to kiss you?"


	9. I Think I Love You

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So I wrote this chapter twice; the first version just wasn't that good, and it ended up with Blaine and Kurt fighting in front of Wes and David… I just couldn't do that to them. I like where this one went much better, even if it is a little shorter than the original version of this chapter. Enjoy!**

Blaine wasn't sure what had possessed him to ask Kurt that question; he wasn't even positive that Kurt was gay, because he knew appearances could be deceiving about things like that. Blaine was so caught up in thinking about how inappropriate and ridiculous his question had been that he almost missed Kurt's response. He shook his head, sighing.

"Sorry… I didn't catch that," Blaine said, hoping that Kurt would repeat himself.

"We chose to be just friends. You had feelings for someone else…"

Blaine sighed, closing his eyes. Given the things he'd noticed about Kurt since he'd woken up, Blaine had sort of hoped that there was something going on between him and Kurt. "So I'm with someone else? Where has he been?"

"No… you're single. It didn't work out." Blaine raised an eyebrow, even more confused now than he had been before.

"But… if I'm not with him…" Blaine shook his head, trying to sort it all out. It was starting making his head ache again. "Why aren't we together?" Blaine watched as Kurt seemed to think about how to respond to his question. Blaine shifted his weight, wincing as pain shot through his broken leg for a moment. He ended up moving so that he was leaning his weight against the bed right next to where Kurt was sitting. He did his best to turn himself so that he would be able to see Kurt's face when the other boy spoke, hoping that it would make it easier for him to figure out what Kurt was saying.

"We were both new to all of this… we chose not to ruin what we already had." Blaine reached out and put his good hand on Kurt's knee.

"What if we took things slow?" Blaine asked. He wasn't sure why, but Blaine felt like there were butterflies in his stomach the entire time he was sitting there with Kurt; it only seemed to get worse the closer he and Kurt got to one another.

"Blaine…" Blaine looked at Kurt, watching as tears started falling out of the other boy's eyes.

"I'm sorry… I didn't mean to upset you. We don't have to…" Blaine began, shifting so that he was moving further from Kurt and moving his hand away from Kurt. He was surprised when Kurt leaned in and pressed a kiss against his cheek, just barely missing his lips. The other boy's words were mumbled and all Blaine could pick up was a low murmur that he couldn't really understand.

"Kurt… I can't understand you. These things don't work very well."

"I want to be with you, Blaine… but I'm afraid you're going to hate me…" Blaine shook his head. So many things were confusing him now; there was too much to think about, too much that he no longer understood.

"So the nurse said no to you going outside. It's too cold…" Blaine turned his head as best he could so that he could see Wes, but the Asian boy wasn't far enough in the room for him to see. Blaine couldn't be sure if the boy had just trailed off in the middle of his thought or if he was still talking and Blaine just couldn't hear him, at least not until Wes asked a question. "Is everything okay?"

"It's fine. Just give us a minute, Wes…" Blaine slowly reached out and put a hand on Kurt's shoulder as he spoke. He waited a moment, hoping that the other boy was leaving them alone; Blaine couldn't hear the boy's footsteps or the door to know whether or not he and Kurt were alone. "Kurt, why would I hate you?"

"One of them went to my old school, Blaine… what if they were looking for me?" Blaine turned away from Kurt, thinking about what Kurt was saying. He didn't feel angry; Blaine didn't really feel any emotion about what Kurt had just told him. With the exception of frustration, confusion, and the strange feeling in the pit of his stomach when Kurt was around, Blaine hadn't really had to deal with any emotions since he'd woken up a few days earlier.

"Then they fucked up?" Blaine suggested, not sure of what else he could say to that question. For some reason he found not knowing what to say incredibly frustrating. Kurt just seemed to find it funny, and that made Blaine smile. "Kurt, I don't hate you. I don't know why I would for that…" Blaine did his best to wipe away the trails of tears from Kurt's eyes, leaning in to press a kiss against the younger boy's cheek. "The only thing I feel… Kurt, I think I'm in love. With you." Blaine watched Kurt's face carefully, trying to figure out what the other boy was thinking. He could tell that Kurt wanted to say something, that he was at least whispering something to himself. "Kurt… don't do that… I can't tell if you're trying to talk to me or not."

"I'm just trying to wrap my head around what you just said…" Blaine closed his eyes, shaking his head slightly.

"You don't have to say anything… I guess I just misunderstood." Blaine did his best to stand up again, leaning most of his weight on the crutch so that his leg wouldn't start hurting again. "Maybe you should just go… I think I'm going to get some more sleep."

"Blaine, that wasn't what I meant… Gaga, do you know how long I've been waiting to hear you say that?" Blaine closed his eyes, shaking his head until he felt a hand against his back. "Come sit down… you probably shouldn't be on your feet this much." Blaine let Kurt help him back the last few steps towards the bed until he could sit down again. He didn't even protest as Kurt helped him lift his broken leg back up into the bed and started propping it up on the pillows there before he hit the button to make the bed lean back a bit further.

"Will you stay with me?" Blaine asked.

"Of course… I'm not going anywhere right now." Blaine shook his head as he saw that Kurt was moving towards the recliner he had vacated a few minutes earlier.

"Will you sit here?" Blaine used his good hand to motion towards the large empty spot on the bed to his right, smiling hopefully at the younger boy who smiled and quickly moved to the other side of the bed to oblige. It was a little cramped, but Blaine didn't mind because it meant that Kurt was right next to him "I really do think I'm in love with you, Kurt. I don't know how else to explain what I'm feeling."

"I've been in love with you for a long time, Blaine. But we said we weren't going to let things get out of hand… that we were going to take things slow, try to stay just friends for a while." Blaine glanced down at his hand, which Kurt had taken in his own and started gently rubbing.

"So you're saying that you don't want us to be together?" Blaine asked.

"I'm saying that I think we should stick with our original plan. You didn't even remember my name, Blaine. You need time to heal, to think about things. Besides, once you get out of the hospital it's going to be a while before we can see each other again… I can't drive to Toledo very often, and I have to go home and visit my family. Carole's already starting to think that she's going to have to bribe me to get me to come home for the weekend."

"Kurt… don't overthink this so much. I'm just saying that I _want_ to be with you. I'm not saying we have to start dating or anything. We can wait." Blaine gently squeezed Kurt's hand.

"We can text when you go home… talking on the phone probably won't work so well."

"I don't have a phone… I think it's in evidence or something," Blaine replied.

"We can get you a new one." Blaine looked up, smiling at the sight of his mother in the doorway. "Besides, you have a computer at home… there's always instant messaging." Blaine turned his head so that he could see Kurt's face, noting the slight smile there.

"We'll take this slow… I'll see you as much as possible, and we'll figure things out as we go." Blaine nodded slowly.

"Okay. Slow is good."


	10. Remember

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So yay for a new chapter! I know it's taken a while; school's getting kind of intense and crazy. Plus my muse is going bananas for a couple of other ideas I've had for Blaine-centric stories (can you all tell that I'm in love with Blaine/Darren?). Anyways, enjoy!**

As much as Kurt hated hospitals, he actually found himself looking forward to going to see Blaine the next afternoon. It was just a matter of time before the boy was released from the hospital; Kurt wasn't even sure why he was still there, unless it had something to do with the head injury and his memory loss. Physically the older boy seemed to be doing okay, even if he couldn't get very far on his own.

He'd purposely chosen to wait until the afternoon; Blaine's father and sister had driven down from Toledo the night before to spend the weekend with him, and Kurt didn't want to intrude on the family's time together. It just didn't feel right for him to be there the whole time, especially when he and Blaine were going to take things slowly. Plus there was the fact that Kurt actually had to do homework to keep up with things at Dalton, and that kept him busy the entire morning and a decent chunk of the afternoon as well.

Kurt wasn't expecting to arrive at the hospital to find that he couldn't go into the older boy's room. The police were there, and from the concerned looks that he could see on Claire and Mr. Anderson's faces, Kurt knew that something was up. "What's going on?" he asked, sitting down in a chair across from the two of them in the lobby down the hall from Blaine's room.

"It was a rough night… I'm not sure any of us got any sleep." Kurt glanced down the hall towards Blaine's room, wondering what exactly had happened. "He's starting to remember what happened… having nightmares. He doesn't want to go to sleep, but he won't give us any details about what he remembers." Kurt turned around as he saw Blaine's father look up at someone passing behind him and realized that the police officers he had spoken to the day before were on their way out. One of them carried what appeared to be a McKinley yearbook.

Kurt waited until Claire got up before he made any kind of move. "Claire, why don't you and Kurt go stay with Blaine for a while. Your mom needs a break, and I think she and I need to talk." Kurt followed the girl down the hall and watched as she knocked on the door before opening it and walking inside.

"Hey, Blaine… Kurt's here." Kurt slowly made his way inside, smiling but not really knowing what to expect. The older boy looked exhausted, and there were tear tracks over his cheeks where Blaine had been crying. Kurt really wasn't sure if the older boy wanted to see him or not, or even if Blaine had heard them coming in. The boy was wearing his hearing aids, but he didn't acknowledge their presence.

Kurt followed Claire into the room, walking over towards the bed as Claire went to speak quietly to her mother. He gently reached out and touched the back of Blaine's right hand to get the boy's attention, although he was surprised at the way the older boy jerked his hand away.

"Hey… it's okay…" Kurt said, looking up at Blaine's face and watching the older boy carefully. He smiled as Blaine looked up at him, hoping everything was okay.

"Sorry… I…" Blaine began, shaking his head. Kurt's heart ached as he saw fresh tears starting to trickle down Blaine's face, creating fresh wet tracks that Kurt did his best to wipe away with one of his thumbs. He used his other hand to rub gentle circles around the back of Blaine's good hand.

"It's okay. Do you want to talk?" Kurt watched as Blaine slowly shook his head.

"Will you lie down? I just want you here with me right now…" Kurt nodded moving so that he could first sit next to the boy and then put an arm around his shoulders. He smiled as Blaine sort of snuggled into his side, or at least did the best he could given his injuries. "I saw some of their faces… they were all in the yearbook the police had."

"They were all McKinley students…"

"The ones I saw, yeah… three of them. I… I didn't see the fourth guy. He was always behind me…" Kurt turned his head to look at the older boy as Blaine's voice trailed off mid-sentence. Blaine's eyes were closed and he had turned his face away from Kurt as much as possible. Kurt reached out and gently pushed some of the curls out of Blaine's face. "I can't remember what they said."

"It's okay," Kurt whispered. The words were out of his mouth before he realized that Blaine couldn't hear him, so he had to repeat himself a little louder. "It's okay."

"Obviously it's not… they kept asking for details I didn't know. Like harassing me was going to make me remember…"

"They're just trying to figure out what happened. I guess they figure that if they ask the right question it'll trigger something."

"It's not working." Kurt turned onto his side, lacing his fingers in with Blaine's good hand and bringing it up so that he could press a soft kiss against the back of it. Even though the older boy's bruises were starting to heal, Kurt still felt the need to be careful. "I don't know that I want to remember… just being able to see their faces is terrifying enough…"

"Hey… you don't have to be so scared. They aren't here. They aren't going to hurt you again, okay? No one is _ever_ going to let them anywhere near you."

"But there are other people…" Blaine began.

"You don't need to worry about it right now, Blaine. Worry about getting better first, okay? I want you to be well enough to come watch us at regionals in a couple of weeks. We all want you to come."

"I'm a mess…"

"We don't care. I know all of the other guys want to see you…" Kurt began.

"They could have come down here."

"We've been telling them to wait… your parents didn't want a ton of people down here crowding you before you were ready. If you're okay with it, I'll let them know they can come. But they're still going to want you to come to the competition."

"We'll see…. I'm sure my parents will have something to say about driving that far to watch a competition I'm not going to be in," Blaine replied.

"We'll both beg. You should get to see your friends." Kurt looked up and smiled at Claire; he'd almost forgotten that the girl was in the room until she spoke up. "There's no way you're missing that competition, even if you can't compete. Not if you want to go."

"You really think we can convince them?"

"Blaine, I'm the baby of the family and you're hurt. There's no way they can resist both of us asking if we can go." Kurt turned to face Blaine again smiling. Even though Kurt could still tell that Blaine had been upset a few minutes before, the older boy had a slight smile on his face.

"Okay… we'll work on them. But don't tell everyone I'm coming, okay? I don't want to get anyone's hopes up." Kurt felt the smile on his face widening as Blaine turned back to look at him.

"Don't worry… I won't say a word. Not even Wes and David."

"You're kind of ridiculously happy about this," Claire commented, giving Kurt a look.

"You guys are going home in a few days, and I can't drive to Toledo very often. If it means I'm going to get to see my best friend, I'm pretty sure I'm allowed to be excited about that. Since I'm not going to get to see him five days a week for a while, anyway."

"Best friend, huh? That's all?"

"Claire… that's all we are. For now, at least. I'll let you know when and if that changes," Blaine commented. "I'm kind of tired… you guys don't mind if I fall asleep, do you?"

"Go ahead and sleep. You need it. We'll be here when you wake up."


	11. Nightmares

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So, I know people are starting to wonder exactly **_**what**_** happened to Blaine – and this chapter will give you your first glimpse into exactly what went on between the time Blaine left his family to head back to Dalton and the prologue of this story. But it's not the whole story, so don't start jumping to conclusions just yet…**

The nightmares weren't getting any better; Blaine did his best to make sure everything got written down, but it wasn't easy given the fact that he was still having some trouble using his hand. It was as if his fingers didn't want to do what he told them to. A cup was easy enough, but things like pens and utensils were still too small to control.

"Do you remember anything else?" Blaine sighed, closing his eyes and turning towards the window and away from his mother.

"No… it's still all in pieces. I can't make sense of most of it… I don't even remember what I did to make them so mad at me."

"Blaine… you probably didn't do anything to those boys." Blaine turned back to look at his mother as she took his hand. He could see that this conversation was upsetting her, but he needed to understand why this had all happened. "You've seen it before, honey. They're just like all of the boys at your old school – they hate what they don't understand."

"They hate me because I'm gay… because I'm in love with Kurt." He closed his eyes as his mother leaned over and pressed a kiss against his forehead, before she put a hand on either side of his face.

"Look at me, Blaine." Blaine did what he was told. "No matter what, you will _always_ have people who love you no matter who you love. Period."

"It's still scaring me…"

"I know, sweetie. It's okay for you to be scared." Blaine smiled slightly as she squeezed his hand. "Just relax for now… you're safe." Blaine closed his eyes, gently giving her hand a squeeze in return. "So you really think that you love him?"

"I don't know how else to explain what I feel… but I'm not sure he feels the same way."

"Blaine, after what I've seen the past week I would be willing to bet you money that Kurt feels the same way… even if he says that you're just friends. That boy is madly in love with you."

"May I come in?" Blaine sighed as the soft voice registered. It was one of the doctors that had been in and out of his hospital room over the few days he had been awake. "How are you doing today?"

"Tired. Neither of us are getting much sleep at the moment," Blaine's mother replied, putting the notepad she'd been writing on down onto the table.

"Nightmares still?"

"It's getting worse. I'm starting to remember more of what happened…" Blaine commented.

"Unfortunately there's nothing I can do about the nightmares. For now you just need to try and tough it out and get as much rest as you can despite the nightmares." Blaine sighed, closing his eyes. "I do have some good news, though… how would you like to go home tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow?"

"I still need to discuss a few things with your parents about doctors visits and things like that, but as long as you're still doing alright I don't see any reason why you should be stuck here any longer."

"If it's that easy, why can't I go home now?" Blaine asked.

"There are still a few things that need to be taken care of first. One of which is that I want you to stay off that foot as much as possible; I want you either in bed or camped out on the couch with your foot up."

"What about the ride home? It's two and a half hours… what about the medication?" Blaine closed his eyes as his mother and the doctor started discussing the details of his release for the next day. He tuned out the conversation, not really caring about the details. He was going home, and that meant that he would be far, far away from what had happened. He couldn't get away from the pain or the memories, but physical distance had to be worth something.

"Blaine? Are you listening?" Blaine turned back to the doctor, confused.

"Sorry… what was that?"

"I guess that answers my question… it's not important, we can go over everything tomorrow to make sure everyone understands. You need to get some rest. Tomorrow's probably going to be pretty rough." Blaine nodded and started fumbling with the dial to turn off the hearing aids as he closed his eyes and started to fall asleep.

* * *

It was too cold to be pumping gas, but he was desperate. Blaine was so close to being back at school, but he didn't have enough gas to make it the last few miles back to the parking lot. Blaine reached up and ran a hand through his hair as he waited for the car to fill up with gas, breaking the hold of his hair gel so that it curled in random chunks.

"Hey… homo!" Blaine didn't turn around, doing his best to ignore the group of rowdy teenagers that had pulled up while he was paying for his own gas. "What, you too good to say hello?" Blaine sighed, pulling the nozzle out of his car and putting it back. He glanced up as he waited for his receipt, his eyes widening as he realized that Dave Karofsky was one of the guys in the truck. Karofsky didn't look too pleased to see him, either.

Blaine looked away quickly, grabbing his receipt and getting back into his car as the group of boys continued to make comments about him and tried to get him to respond. He flinched as he saw one of the boys start walking towards his car, but he managed to turn it on and drive off before the boy got close enough to do anything.

Blaine's heart was racing as he opened his eyes, staring up at the ceiling as he tried to catch his breath. It hurt to breathe; the broken ribs in his chest ached from the stress they were being forced to handle. He could feel someone grabbing his free hand as a hand gently brushed at the curls on his forehead.

"Mom?" Blaine turned his head to the right so that he could see her, smiling slightly and relaxing as he realized that he was still in the hospital. He closed his eyes again, drifting back to sleep. When Blaine woke up again, he didn't remember anything about the dream.

**A/n: I know it's short – don't kill me! But I felt like that was the appropriate place to end things here. Plus I wanted to get this chapter up before we see the insanity that is drunk Gleeks tonight, lol!**


	12. Going Home

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: This chapter took too a long time for me to write, and I apologize for the delay. It just took me a while to figure out exactly what I wanted to do at this point in the story; I feel like I wasted a lot of time on the hospital scenes, but there were so many things I wanted to get in there and I didn't want ridiculously long chapters. And I'm sorry for being kind of evil with this chapter, lol.**

The car ride was _not_ going well. It had started out alright – Blaine's parents had pushed the front seat of his father's SUV as far back as it would go, making just enough room to get his broken leg inside. One of the nurses had given Blaine a dose of pain medication right before they left the hospital room so that he would sleep most of the ride home. But that had been completely dependent on the idea that he would be home in less than three hours. No one had counted on running into a traffic jam an hour from home, and whatever had happened ahead of them was bad because traffic had been completely stopped for an hour and a half already.

Blaine shifted in his seat slightly, wincing as pain shot through his body. The pills were supposed to last four hours, and he was at the very end of that time period with no chance of getting any more medication any time soon.

"We should have asked for the prescription yesterday so we could get it filled." Blaine felt his mother gently touch his shoulder from the backseat as she spoke. "How are you holding up, sweetie?"

"It hurts to move already…" Blaine began.

"Just hang in there… traffic has to start moving again soon. We'll stop by the pharmacy on the way home and pick up your prescription." Blaine just nodded and tightened his grip on the door handle as he shifted his weight again, trying to find a more comfortable position. He'd been sitting up for a lot longer than he'd planned, and all he really wanted to do was lay down. "Lea, do you have anything in your purse other than Tylenol?"

"Just some ibuprofen," Blaine's mother replied.

"Give him a couple… it won't do much, but it'll take the edge off for now." Blaine carefully took the pills when his mother offered them, tossing them into his mouth and taking a sip of water to help him swallow them. "Try and go back to sleep, son. We're going to get you home as soon as we can." Blaine closed his eyes again, trying to do what his father suggested. It was difficult given the fact that it was impossible to ignore the pain. It was everywhere, intensifying as the prescription wore off. Blaine just hoped that the ibuprofen would do _something_ for him; he couldn't take much more of this.

"We've got to get him home… I can't stand seeing him in pain like this." Blaine didn't bother to open his eyes even though his parents were talking about him as if he wasn't there.

"I know… we should have gotten his pain medicine filled before we left Westerville," his father replied. Blaine felt a hand stroking through his hair in a comforting gesture. "I don't know how we're going to get him in the house like this… I don't know that he's going to be able to put any weight on his leg with it already hurting like that." Blaine reached up and turned off his hearing aids, not wanting to listen to any more. He was dreading having to do anything that required movement at this point, and he hated listening to his parents talk about him like he wasn't there. It seemed to be happening more and more; they kept discussing things in front of him that Blaine didn't really want to hear about, mostly dealing with the medical side of what was going on.

The problem with turning off the hearing aids so that he wouldn't have to hear all of that was that it meant that the only thing Blaine had to pay attention to was the pain. He'd thought that trying to move around with a broken leg was bad, but at least he'd had the pain medication before. Now he wasn't even moving and pain was still radiating through his body.

Blaine didn't remember falling asleep; one minute he was doing his best to just deal with the pain, and the next his father was telling him that it was time to wake up. Blaine hadn't even noticed the man turning on the hearing aids.

"Do I really have to move?"

"It's too cold out here, kiddo. We need to get you inside," his father replied. Blaine groaned as he realized that he was about to have to deal with more pain. He opened his eyes and started moving to unbuckle his seatbelt. The pain had gotten worse, which Blaine hadn't even thought was possible. "Here… this'll help." Blaine glanced down at the white pill his father held out to him. He took it, smiling slightly at the man in relief. He popped it in his mouth, following it with a sip of water to help him swallow.

"Thanks." Blaine closed his eyes and did his best to think about something other than how much he wanted the medicine to work faster. He winced as the car moved as one of the doors was closed, dreading the fact that his own door would open in a moment and he would have to actually start moving. "I don't think I can do this…" he muttered as the cold air hit him.

"I know it hurts, Blaine, but you have to get inside. It's too cold out here and I don't want you to get sick on top of everything else." Blaine sighed, opening his eyes and letting his father help him turn so that he could put his uninjured foot on the ground first. "Just take it slow… don't hurt yourself."

"It's going to hurt no matter what," Blaine muttered, slowly putting some weight on his right leg. It took him a moment to catch his breath so that he could move again. "At least I don't have to walk the whole way." Blaine leaned most of his weight against his father as he slowly took a few steps until he could sit down in the wheelchair that the orthopedic surgeon had insisted on prescribing for him, at least until he was in less pain. "This is embarrassing…"

"It's temporary." Blaine didn't bother to comment again as his father began pushing him towards the house. He just wanted to lay down somewhere. "Maria, Claire, and I moved some things around the other day… we switched my office and your bedroom so that you wouldn't have to deal with the stairs. As soon as the cast comes off we'll switch them back."

"You moved all of my furniture?"

"Just the essentials. Your bed, some of your clothes. We can bring you whatever else you need…"

"I don't want you all to have to wait on me," Blaine replied.

"Until that leg heals, you're supposed to stay off it as much as possible. You don't have much of a choice, kiddo…"

"I wish things could go back to normal already."

"I hate to tell you this, Blaine, but things can't go back to the way they were. Not completely."


	13. Rehearsals

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So this chapter's interesting to me… I thought it would be fun to see what the other Warblers would think when they found out about Blaine. I'm not exactly sure where this idea came from, but I sort of like it. And at least Blaine is sort of in this chapter…**

Kurt couldn't help but be anxious as he waited for his last class of the day to end. He'd gotten a text message right at the end of lunch from Blaine saying that he'd gotten a new phone, but Kurt hadn't had a chance to respond to the older boy or anything thanks to having to sit through the remainder of the day's classes. Every time he'd almost gotten a minute to send Blaine a text, something else had come up to distract him because there were so many other things that had to be taken care of.

The bell rang signaling the end of class and Kurt sighed thankfully. He had thirty minutes before Warblers rehearsal began, meaning that if Blaine was awake they would have thirty minutes to text before he had to turn his phone off again. "Warblers at four instead of five," Nick commented, stopping by Kurt's desk on his way out of the classroom.

"Yeah, see you there," Kurt replied, pulling his phone out of his pocket and turning it back on so that he would be able to text the older boy back finally. He could see Nick shaking his head and walking away with a slight smile on his face.

"Hey, tell Blaine we all miss him."

"How did you…?"

"You've been fiddling with your cell phone in your pocket all afternoon. I haven't seen you do that since the day they found him." Kurt shook his head and sighed.

"Am I that obvious?"

"Yes. Plus I overheard Wes and David talking about an interesting conversation that they apparently overheard at the hospital a few days ago. The one where you and Blaine finally got your heads out of your asses and admitted that you're kind of madly in love with each other."

"Oh Gaga… does everyone know?" Kurt asked.

"That the two of you are crazy about each other? Yes. That you're actually doing something about it? No. Now go text your loverboy already." Kurt couldn't help but smile at Nick's joking comment; at McKinley, only his fellow glee clubbers would have been so accepting. Here it didn't seem to matter – he'd never seen a single disgusted face when he'd done or said anything that would make it obvious he was gay. And there were absolutely no rude comments or gestures, no threats. It was such a stark contrast.

Kurt glanced down at his phone as it lit up, signaling that he'd received a text message while he had been in class.

_Sorry… I forgot you had class. Text me when you get a chance._

Kurt couldn't help but smile at the apology. It was so ridiculous – Blaine didn't have anything to apologize for. Kurt knew that if he was in Blaine's position, there was no way he would remember what day it was, either.

_Don't worry about it. I'm out of classes, and I have a little time before Warblers. Nick said to tell you we all miss you._

Kurt packed up his books, picking up his bag and starting out of the classroom. He decided to just go ahead to the Warblers' hall to finish the conversation, pretty sure that he would get a million messages to pass on to Blaine since he was the only one who had the boy's new telephone number.

There were already a few people in the room by the time Kurt got there, but he ignored them and retreated to one of the sofas in the back, pulling out his phone as he felt it vibrate again.

_Which one is Nick again?_

Kurt sighed. It seemed like every time he'd almost forgotten about Blaine's memory loss, something came up that made him realize that the older boy was still missing a lot. Kurt looked around the room, spotting Nick and taking a quick picture to send to Blaine to help the older boy's memory.

_The dark haired one next to Wes is Nick. And the guy on the other side of David is Thad_.

"You aren't supposed to take pictures of people without their knowledge, you know." Kurt looked up, smiling at the blond boy who had sat down across from him on another sofa.

"I was taking it for Blaine… he's having trouble putting names with faces." Kurt watched as Jeff nodded, the joking smirk on the other boy's face disappearing as he realized exactly what that meant.

"He doesn't remember anyone?" 

"He's just trying to put the pieces back together. It's taking a while…" Kurt glanced down at his phone as it vibrated again.

_Yeah… I think I remember them. How are things at Dalton?_

_Same old thing. Working on stuff for Regionals, but it's not the same without you._

Kurt looked down at what he'd typed, wondering if he should really send that to Blaine. He didn't want to upset the older boy – the guy had enough to deal with at the moment without having to think about the fact that he was missing out on preparing for Regionals. In the end, Kurt hit send because he didn't know what else he could say.

"You look like you're still pretty worried about him," Jeff commented.

"I can't help it… he still doesn't remember so much about what happened. And I'm not sure he completely understands what's going on…"

"This is Blaine we're talking about…" Jeff began.

"You haven't talked to him, Jeff. I'm not sure how much you know…" Kurt stopped himself and sighed. "Blaine's not coming back to the Warblers. At this point I'm not even sure he's going to be back at Dalton this school year." Kurt watched as Jeff processed what he was saying.

"At least we'll have him back next year… and it'll give him another year to compete with us if he's not going to finish the year." Kurt shook his head.

"Blaine's not going to be a Warbler, Jeff. He can't…"

"What are you talking about?" Kurt looked up, realizing that a few of the other Warblers had walked up behind him while he was talking to Jeff. He looked over at Wes and David, both of whom nodded and walked towards the group.

"Guys, Blaine most likely won't be able to come back to the Warblers," Wes said, crossing his arms. He was better at delivering bad news than Kurt was, and it was better that everyone heard it at once than having it come out bit by bit through gossip. "He lost almost all of his hearing… I don't understand it exactly, but they're talking like this is permanent. Even with hearing aids, he's still struggling…"

"So we've lost our lead singer. Permanently."

"It's not like he was going to be at Dalton forever," David replied, smiling slightly at Thad in response to the other boy's comment. "It's just a little sooner than expected."

"We don't have anyone who can fill Blaine's shoes… what are we going to do about lead?" Jeff asked. Kurt felt his phone vibrate in his hand again and pit down on his lower lip. He glanced at it briefly, reading the message from Blaine.

_I'd rather be there. It feels like all I do is sleep and eat – stupid meds make me so tired._

"We have to work with what we've got. Even without Blaine we have a lot of talent – plenty to win Regionals. We can do this." David seemed a hell of a lot more confident that Kurt felt, but he had to believe that the older boy knew what he was talking about.

"I'd still feel better if Blaine was here – all of our plans were made counting on having him here…" Nick began.

"Well we don't have him for Regionals, no matter what happens otherwise. Which means we have to figure everything out without him anyway. We should get started, guys – we have a lot to do." Everyone else stood up at Wes's comment, realizing that he was right. They were going to have to work twice as hard as their competition if they wanted to have a chance at winning now.

_Rehearsal's starting. But it'll get better. Miss you._


	14. Never Again

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So I had this chapter almost written. And then I decided that I hated what I'd done because it was purely filler, and that I needed to start all over and write something that was actually worth asking all of you to read. So hopefully you'll like this chapter!**

Blaine really hadn't planned on staying out so late, even though it was a Friday night. Technically there was a curfew at Dalton, but students could get around that with permission from their parents. And Blaine's parents had called the school and let them know that he'd been at dinner with them and that he was going to be later than originally expected getting back to school. The fact that he'd been forced to stop for gas had pushed him further behind getting back, especially after he'd run into Dave Karofsky and some of the football player's friends at the gas station. Blaine hadn't really thought much of it once he'd left; the McKinley student hadn't said a word to him despite the comments coming from the remainder of the group.

It wasn't until Blaine was getting out of his car in the juniors parking lot at Dalton that he even thought about the boys that had been trying to start something at the gas station. He felt a hand clamp down on his mouth before he even knew that someone was behind him, and Blaine immediately started struggling as an arm wrapped around his waist.

"What, you going to put up a fight now, homo? Where was all this spirit when you ran away from us earlier, huh?" Blaine scratched at the hand that covered his mouth, trying to pull it away so that he could scream and hopefully get someone's attention. The person holding him was a hell of a lot stronger than he was. "Get his feet. I can't carry him like this." Another figure came around and Blaine tried to kick, but the guy managed to grab onto his legs and hold them so that Blaine was effectively trapped. "Get him in the truck."

"Dude… you said we were just going to scare him…" a familiar voice said. Blaine cut his eyes to the side and saw Dave Karofsky standing by the truck, looking less than pleased at what was going on.

"We are… we're just having a little fun while we're doing it." Blaine didn't stop struggling until another guy came into his line of sight and landed a punch in Blaine's stomach.

"Hey! We weren't going to hurt him!"

"Shut it, Karofsky! You're in this now, so either help us or shut the fuck up!" Blaine opened his mouth and did his best to bite down on the hand that was still clamped across his mouth. His whole world went black before he could even begin to scream.

* * *

Blaine's chest was aching again when he woke up, his heart racing as he struggled to catch his breath. He instinctively grabbed at the hand that had reached out to push the curls out of his face, blinking as the person turned on the light. Blaine relaxed when he realized that it was his mother, sitting on the edge of his bed. She said something to him that Blaine didn't hear, and he still hadn't quite grasped the art of reading lips. Blaine finally let his eyes close, drifting back off to sleep as his mother stroked his hair in a comforting gesture.

By the time Blaine woke up the next morning, his mother had already gone. That was usually how things happened – he woke up in the middle of the night after a nightmare to his mother doing her best to comfort him. By the next morning, she'd already woken up to go get ready for the day, and then she would come back to help Blaine get ready. It meant he usually ended up laying in bed for another fifteen minutes or so, but he couldn't really get up without help. He watched the door as he waited, hoping it wouldn't take too long.

He was surprised when his father came in rather than his mother, until he realized that his dad being there meant it was Saturday. Which meant that they were driving to Dayton for Regionals so that Blaine could see his friends. "When are we leaving?" Blaine asked, turning on the hearing aid in his right ear after his father gave it to him.

"It's a two and a half hour drive… we're going to leave about 9:30 so that we have plenty of time to get down there," the man said, helping Blaine sit up and put his broken leg down on the floor. Technically Blaine probably could have gotten out of the bed on his own, but he usually woke up long after his last pain pill wore off and he really didn't want to deal with the pain that would go along with trying to move on his own. "Your mom's running late, as usual. What do you need me to help you do?"

"Get dressed first…" Blaine watched as his father walked over to the dresser and started to search for clothes. "Dad… there's an outfit on top of the dresser."

It took a lot longer for Blaine to get ready with his father's help than it would have if his mother had been helping him instead. They were only running about ten minutes behind schedule when they left, but between some unexpected traffic and having to stop a few of times for various reasons they barely made it to the venue in time to get inside for the competition.

The Warblers were first to perform, and Blaine was sort of glad for that because it meant he would get to spend more time with Kurt once they were off stage. Blaine couldn't completely understand what they were saying as they sang; everything still sounded off through the hearing aids despite the fact that he had been back to the audiologist more than once to have them adjusted. He could sort of make out the words to their songs, but Blaine had a feeling that he wasn't going to have any idea who would win the competition when it was all said and done. There were just too many things that he couldn't quite pick out.

Despite the fact that he couldn't really hear what was going on, Blaine still clapped for his teammates at the end of their performance. As soon as they had left the stage, Blaine pulled out his phone and sent a text to Kurt, telling the younger boy where he was. It took all of about two minutes for Blaine to be surrounded by Warblers even though most of them were hanging back a bit, as if they were afraid to get too close for fear of hurting him.

"Would you guys mind if Blaine went and sat with us? We have an extra seat and we'd like to hang out with him for a while," David said. Blaine turned to look at his parents, smiling hopefully.

"Alright… just bring him back before you go on stage for the awards. We aren't planning on staying too late," Blaine's mom said. He smiled and let Kurt help him to his feet, the other boy's arms wrapping around him in a hug before they started down a few more rows to a group of empty seat with Blaine leaning part of his weight on Kurt's shoulders.

"Are you okay?" Kurt asked as they walked, quite a bit slower than the other Warblers. Blaine knew why he asked; ever since the Warblers had left the stage, Blaine had been realized just how much he missed everything to do with the Warblers and singing. Blaine really wasn't good at hiding his emotions.

"I just missed my first competition since I started at Dalton. And it's just sort of become real… that this is how my life is going to be from now on. That I don't get to really be a part of this any more."

"Don't talk like that, Blaine…"

"It's the truth. It's not coming back, Kurt. I can't sing if I can't hear myself… I'm never going to be a Warbler again…"


	15. Breaking Down

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So yeah, I know this chapter took me forever. But things have been crazy lately with school. Luckily I'm almost done with the semester – exams start in less than 48 hours! Anyway, I hope you all enjoy this chapter!**

Blaine stared out the car window, doing his best to keep his composure even though he wanted nothing more than to break down and cry as they drove home from the competition. The Warblers had lost to New Directions, although it hadn't exactly been unexpected. They'd started out at a disadvantage because they'd had to completely rearrange their setlist two weeks before competition and find completely new soloists to fill the gap Blaine had left behind. Not to mention that Blaine was fairly sure that they had missed at least a couple of rehearsals given the amount of time Wes, David, and Kurt had spent at the hospital with him.

"It was a good competition. Although I do feel bad for the seniors now that they don't have another chance to go to Nationals." Blaine sighed, closing his eyes and reaching up with his good hand to wipe away a couple of tears. "Blaine? Are you okay?"

"Can we not talk about the competition, please? I don't want to think about the Warblers right now…"

"What's wrong, sweetie?" Blaine shook his head slightly as his mother's hand reached up to gently touch his shoulder.

"I just… I'm not going to be a Warbler again."

"Don't say that, Blaine…" his father began.

"It's the truth! I couldn't understand anything I heard at the competition and I can't really hear my own voice… and don't try to tell me this is temporary, because we all know that isn't true." Blaine closed his eyes again, forgetting all pretense of not crying in front of his family. The tears were streaming down his face whether he wanted them to or not, and there was nothing he could do to stop it.

"Maybe this wasn't the best idea…" his mother began.

"N-no… I wanted to go. I-I needed this." Blaine wanted more than anything to hit something, but he knew that wasn't a good idea. He only had one good arm already, and there were too many things that could be broken in the car. "I needed to know… t-to know that it was over."

"It's not…"

"Everything's changed…" Blaine shook his head, doing his best to stop crying before it turned into the gasping, choking sobs that would make his chest ache until he couldn't breathe. But he couldn't stop himself; once Blaine was started, it was all he could do to just wait it out. By the time he was done, every movement he made was enough to make the tears start again from pain.

Almost as soon as the pain medication was in his stomach, Blaine felt his eyelids grow heavy. The pills still knocked him out every time, to the point that he barely even noticed his father helping him out of the car and into the wheelchair again, taking him into the house and putting him on the couch. It was already dark by the time he woke up, thanks to the combination of the pills and the exhaustion that came with being out all day.

Blaine didn't hear the phone ringing or the conversation that followed, but he did feel the couch shift as his mother sat down on the edge of it and started gently stroking the side of his face. He slowly opened his eyes, smiling slightly at her as she turned the hearing aids back on.

"Sweetie… I need you to wake up for me."

"What's going on?" Blaine watched his mother closely as she looked away from him for a moment, sighing. "Mom?"

"The police just called. They've made a couple of arrests…" Blaine closed his eyes, taking a deep breath; he wasn't sure if he was ready for this. He could feel his heart starting to pound in his chest. "Blaine?"

"I don't know if I'm ready for this…"

"You don't have to do anything yet, Blaine. It's still going to be a while before there's anything you'll have to do. They wanted us to know that the boys are being arraigned Monday morning."

"How many of them?" Blaine asked.

"Three."

"Did they give you any names?"

"No, sweetie. Don't worry about it, okay?"

"I want to go Monday…" Blaine began.

"I don't know if that's such a good idea, sweetie. It's a long drive, and you're still not getting around very well." Blaine sighed, knowing that his mother was right.

"I want to go. And I want to visit my friends at school. Not to mention that we have to figure out what we're doing about my schoolwork…"

"And we can do that once you've had a chance to heal some more. Today was too stressful. You won't be able to enjoy the time with your friends if you're miserable." Blaine closed his eyes, sighing.

"I just don't… I want my life to go back to normal. I want this to all be some bad joke, a nightmare that I'll wake up from in the morning, in my room at Dalton."

"I know, Blaine. But you'll have to realize that this is your new life and there's nothing you can do that's going to change that. It's hard, but you're going to accept this eventually. You're going to be okay."

* * *

Blaine stood next to Kurt in line, smiling at the younger boy. "I can't believe you got us these tickets… they sold out so fast!"

"I have my ways. And it's worth it, if I get to see you smile." Blaine wrapped his arms around the younger boy and pulled him closer, smiling at him. It made him ridiculously happy to see Kurt smiling back at him.

"You're such a sap. But I love you for it." Blaine glanced over at the people in front of them and realized that the line was moving.

"Come on… it looks like they're finally letting people in." Blaine kept an arm around Kurt's waist as they walked towards the entrance to the amphitheatre so that they could get to their seats. He'd told Kurt he'd gotten them tickets for the concert, but he hadn't told him where their seats were. He'd wanted to leave one surprise for tonight.

As soon as their tickets were scanned, Blaine led Kurt through the crowds and down towards the stage. They passed a couple of different members of the venue staff, with Blaine showing their tickets each time so that they could pass by and get to their seats.

"Where are our seats?" Kurt finally asked.

"You'll see."

"I'm starting to think you did something crazy… we're almost down to the front row."

"Well, that is where we're headed," Blaine replied, shooting a smirk towards Kurt. He couldn't help but laugh as the younger boy stopped dead in his tracks, his jaw practically hitting the ground. "Come on, Kurt… we have to get to our seats."

"You bought front row seats?"

"Front and center, yes."

"Are you crazy?"

"Only about you," Blaine replied, tugging on Kurt's arm and pulling him into a tight hug. "Now I'm going to our seats… are you going to go with me or not?"

"I just need to do something first." Blaine felt Kurt's lips press against his and he returned the kiss quickly.

It wasn't fear that woke Blaine up from his dream; he wasn't sure what it was that woke him up, but it was frustrating. He'd been ridiculously happy in his dream, but that was all it had been. Blaine curled his good hand into a fist, suddenly incredibly angry. He slammed his fist down against the mattress, knowing it wouldn't really do him any good.

Blaine felt the hot, angry tears sliding down his face because it wasn't fair; he would never get to experience that dream. Technically he could probably still take Kurt to a concert, but he wouldn't really be able to enjoy it. There would be too much noise, too many distractions. He wouldn't be able to actually have any kind of conversation with Kurt if they did go somewhere like that. Of course, that was all dependent on whether or not Kurt would even be willing to be with him after everything that had happened.


	16. School Blues

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: And another chapter! Exams are over (hallelujah!), which means I'll hopefully be able to write more. Working retail is a lot less time consuming than school!**

Blaine was tired of being stuck at home; he wanted nothing more than to get out of the house and go _do_ something. But the fact that he couldn't put any weight on his broken leg for more than a few minutes and his inability to actually use crutches thanks to his broken arm severely limited his opportunities to get out and do anything. His friends were too far away to go anywhere with him, and getting out on his own wasn't an option. Which meant that Blaine was completely at the mercy of his parents and their ridiculous schedules, all of which was made even more complicated by the plethora of doctors appointments and visits from various therapists that he'd been enduring ever since he'd gotten home.

The chemistry worksheet sitting on the lap desk in front of him was the last thing Blaine really wanted to be thinking about. He knew that it was a lost cause at this point; there was no way Blaine was going to get caught up by the end of the semester, and he wasn't sure that even the summer would give him enough time to get back on track with his schoolwork. It wasn't for a lack of trying; Blaine had spent hours and hours working on trying to catch up, but he felt as though he was missing something. The grades he'd gotten back so far were nowhere near the grades he had been getting when he was actually at Dalton. Truth be told, his grades were dropping like crazy. He was still passing, of course, but barely. Blaine wasn't sure what he could do to fix this.

Blaine's parents didn't seem to be that concerned about his grades; whenever he said anything about it, they just told him that he shouldn't worry too much about it and changed the subject. It was annoying and Blaine had snapped at both his parents and Claire more than once over it. No one seemed to want to tell him what was going on or explain why it didn't seem as though his teachers were sending all of the schoolwork he was supposed to be getting through.

Blaine closed his eyes, letting the paper drop to the floor where he couldn't exactly reach it. Not that it mattered, really. He didn't know how to do the work, nor did he really care any more. "You dropped this." Blaine glanced up as Claire held the paper out towards him.

"Does it even matter? It's not like I'm going to be going back to school any time soon…"

"You don't know that, Blaine…" Claire began.

"I can't hear well enough for classes, and that's not even thinking about how the hell I'd get around. I'm starting to think that no one even thinks I'll be able to handle the work because I know they aren't sending me everything, and my grades have gone to shit because I just don't get all of it…"

"Blaine…"

"I'm just starting to think it isn't worth it to even try because no one expects me to succeed anyway. What's the point in actually working for something that I'm not going to be able to do anyway?" Blaine asked. He took the worksheet from Claire's hand and put it away inside the chemistry book that had been lying open on the bed next to him. He reached up with his good hand and rubbed at his eyes behind his glasses.

Blaine opened his eyes again as he felt the bed shift under Claire's weight, his younger sister scooting closer so that she could hug him. Blaine closed his eyes as Claire's arm snaked around his waist and she gently pulled him into a tight hug. "You act like this is the end of the world. It's one semester of school…"

"Dalton doesn't work the same way, Claire… I fuck up one semester, and I have to repeat the entire year…" Blaine began.

"Okay, so it's one school year. You'll repeat it and everything will get back to normal."

"Claire… do you have any idea how much this really fucks up everything? What decent school is going to take a kid that needed five years to finish high school and who can't hear anything?"

"Any school that would refuse you because of that isn't worth worrying about… you aren't the first person to have something like this happen and you aren't going to be the last. You'll get into college."

"But I won't be getting into an Ivy like Alex. I'm going to disappoint everyone…"

"Blaine, Mom and Dad will be thrilled no matter what schools you get into. And the grandparents will get over it if you don't get into an Ivy. They can't expect you to be perfect. Although my guess is that as long as you get your grades back up, the Ivies are going to be fighting over you… think about it. To overcome something like this is kind of huge. And I know you can do it."

"You can't know…"

"No one thought you were going to make it after those guys beat you up. You proved everyone wrong… you woke up, you're going to be fine once your bones heal, and you're doing really well learning to work with the hearing aids."

"I just…"

"You're worrying too much. You should forget about school while you can, focus on getting back on you feet. You have a free pass to not do homework again until August… take advantage of that while you can."

Blaine closed his eyes and let his head rest against the side of Claire's. "Thank you."

"Do you want some ice cream? I bet we can talk Mom into taking us to Cold Stone…"

"It's March, Claire…"

"So? Ice cream doesn't lose its flavor just because it's cold outside…" Blaine smiled, shaking his head.

"I can't believe I'm letting you talk me into this. Help me up, will you?" Blaine couldn't help but wince as he shifted his weight onto his broken leg.

"That still hurts?"

"I haven't been taking the pain meds for the past couple of days. Well, except at night… it hurts more then. But it's really only bad when I try to put weight on it…"

"Which is probably why you aren't supposed to be up on that leg unless absolutely necessary. What are you two planning?" Blaine glanced up and realized that their mom was standing in the door with her arms crossed. If it weren't for the smile on her face, Blaine would have thought that she was upset with them.

"Ice cream. Any chance we can go to Cold Stone?" Claire asked.

"Maybe later, once Blaine's friends get here." Blaine raised an eyebrow. "A few of the boys asked if they could come over this weekend. They should be here any minute…"

"Kurt didn't say anything about coming over…" Blaine began. He was surprised when his mother held up his phone.

"You keep forgetting this in strange places. I found it in the freezer… you missed a half dozen messages, mostly from Kurt. Which is why Kurt called me." Blaine raised an eyebrow as he took the phone from his mother. He didn't even remember being in the freezer that day.

"When did I put my phone in the freezer?"

"Probably last night when you got that popsicle," Claire replied. Blaine nodded, realizing that she was probably right. He'd forgotten about that.

"Right… I'd forgotten about that…"

"Just try to be more careful. You're lucky that a freezer won't hurt a cell phone, but I don't even want to know where else you might leave it." Blaine nodded, slipping the phone back into his pocket and grabbing the crutch that was leaning against the wall so that he could use it to hobble out to the couch. "And make sure you put that foot back up. You don't need that foot to start swelling…" Blaine nodded, sighing as his mother reminded him about his foot for the millionth time.

"I know, I know. You've only reminded me a couple of hundred times since I got home…" Blaine slowly made his way out to the couch, ignoring the way his mom and sister seemed to hover around him as he moved. "I'm perfectly capable of making it to the couch. I've done it plenty of times without any help."

"We just want to make sure that you don't fall and hurt yourself."

"I'm not going to fall." Blaine dropped the crutch on the floor next to the couch and sat down, lifting his leg up onto the couch and leaning back against the cushions. "See? I made it all the way out here by myself. At least I'm still capable of something…"

"Blaine…" His mother was cut off by the sound of the doorbell ringing and she sighed. "We'll finish this conversation later, after your friends are gone."


	17. Revelations

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: Alright new chapter for you lovelies! Sorry for the delay… I've had one hell of a week.**

The group of Dalton boys hanging out around the living room wasn't the best situation for Blaine, at least as far as attempting to socialize. There was too much noise, too many different conversations going on. He could hear Kurt alright because the younger boy was sitting right next to him, but most of the other guys were too far away from him for Blaine to be able to keep up with what was going on. Blaine spent most of the time just sitting there silently, doing his best to listen to what they were all trying to tell him about Dalton but not really worrying about it.

The few things Blaine did manage to catch didn't completely make sense; there were names and examples being thrown around that Blaine couldn't quite connect with anything in his memory. There were still so many things missing; it had been weeks since he had been attacked, but he still couldn't bring back most of the things that he should have known.

"We should probably hit the road… Mr. Chalmerson assigned a report on World War II this afternoon that's due Monday morning, and that unfortunately applies to about half of us." Blaine smiled as Wes stood up and started leading a group towards the door. "It was good to see you again, man. We'll try and get out here to see you again soon, okay?" Blaine nodded, waving at the group that walked out of the room. He was sort of happy that Kurt wasn't one of the people leaving.

Blaine glanced at Kurt as he felt the boy put a hand on his knee. "You okay?" Blaine shrugged slightly, reaching up and brushing some of the hair out of his face.

"Just tired… it's kind of hard to keep up with everything that's going on when there are a lot of people around," Blaine explained. He saw Kurt nod.

"I'm sorry… I should have thought about that before I asked your mom if it was okay for some other people to come with me…"

"It's okay. You didn't know…" Blaine closed his eyes for a moment, a little surprised when he realized that most of the others had gotten up.

"We should let you get some rest, then. See you, man." Blaine smiled and waved as the remainder of the guys got up and left, leaving him alone with Kurt. Blaine reached across and took Kurt's hand with his uninjured one, lacing their fingers together for a moment. He turned towards the younger boy and smiled slightly.

"Thanks anyway. It was nice to see everyone again," Blaine commented. "I've missed you."

"I've been missing you, too. I sort of got worried when you weren't returning my texts…"

"I left my phone in the freezer last night. I'm not doing so well remembering things like that…" Blaine glanced down at their hands, biting down on his bottom lip. "I'm scared, Kurt. I feel like I'm losing my mind… I keep losing my phone, what little schoolwork I'm given ends up just being an incoherent mess and I haven't gotten a decent grade on anything since I got out of the hospital…"

"Blaine, you're going to be fine… it's just going to take some time for you to get everything back." Blaine smiled as Kurt reached up and gently stroked his cheek. "You just need to give yourself some more time to heal. You're too impatient… just relax, give yourself some time to rest. You can worry about school later, once you're back on track."

"No one seems to think I can do anything any more… my family watches me constantly, like they're afraid I'm going to do something to hurt myself. I just feel like they think I can't do anything… like I'm useless." Blaine closed his eyes and sighed. It wasn't until he felt Kurt's lips pressed against his cheek that he opened his eyes again. Kurt's lips gently pressed against his for a brief moment, and Blaine couldn't help the smile that followed the kiss.

"You're not useless. They just want to take care of you, to make sure that you're okay. You've been through a lot lately… they just want to protect you."

"I don't need to be protected. I need to start getting back on my feet… start getting my life back together. I can't do that when they won't let me do anything for myself," Blaine replied.

"It can wait, Blaine. You don't need to rush yourself…" 

"I want my life back, Kurt. I want to be back at Dalton, I want to be a Warbler again… I want to be normal."

"I hate to tell you this, but you were never normal to begin with," Kurt replied. Blaine couldn't help the smile at the younger boy's words.

"I want my life to be the way it was… before." He watched as Kurt's face fell, and Blaine closed his eyes. He knew what the answer would be, that there was no way his life was going to go back to what it was before he had been attacked.

"Blaine…"

"I know. It's not going to happen. I just… I want it to be that way. I want everything to be okay again. I don't want my family to be forced to take care of me. Or to even feel like they need to take care of me. I'm seventeen, Kurt… I'm almost an adult. And I can't even get out of bed to go to the bathroom without someone watching every single step I take…"

"It'll pass. You're starting to heal, the casts will come off in another month or so… physically, you should be okay by Wes and David's graduation in June. You jut have to give yourself the time to heal."

"You make it sound so easy…" Blaine began.

"I know it isn't. But you'll get used to this new normal… and you're going to be your amazing self again as soon as you adapt to this new situation. I know you can do it." Blaine smiled slightly, thankful for Kurt.

"How is it that you know exactly what to say?" Blaine asked. He wanted to lean over and let his head rest against Kurt's shoulder, but the angle would have been uncomfortable because of his broken collarbone.

"I didn't know exactly what to say… I just said exactly what I thought. I know you pretty well, Blaine. You're stubborn as hell, and you can accomplish so much. You just need to be willing to let other people help you and take care of you until your body is ready for you to do all of those things." Blaine closed his eyes as Kurt leaned in again and gently pressed a kiss on the tip of his nose.

"You know we haven't kissed before this… at least not on the lips."

"I know. But… I don't know that I want things to stay the same. I miss you so much more than I should for someone who's just my friend. I want us to be something more… I want to take you home and introduce you to my family as my boyfriend. I want to be able to kiss you whenever I want, just because." Blaine was only slightly surprised by the kiss that followed Kurt's statement.

"I love you, Kurt. And I want those things, too…"

"Then you're saying that you'll be my boyfriend?" Kurt asked. Blaine nodded slowly, his smile growing.

"I only remember bits and pieces of the time I spent with you before all of this happened… but I still feel like I'm _supposed_ to be your boyfriend, like you're the only person I want to be with," Blaine replied. "I've wanted this ever since that day in the hospital…" Blaine smiled as Kurt leaned in to press another kiss against his lips. They stayed that way for a while, barely pulling away from each other long enough to breathe.

"Well it's about time." Blaine finally pulled away from Kurt, turning towards where he _thought_ the voice came from. He sighed as he saw Claire standing next to the couch with her arms crossed and a smile on her face. "So does this mean you two are officially dating now?"

"Yeah, Claire… I guess it does."

"Good. Should I tell Mom that your boyfriend is staying for dinner, then?"


	18. Regrets

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: Yes, I decided to fix the ending of this story. I've felt bad about the cop-out ending I left all of you with back during the summer, and I've intended to fix this the whole time. I think I just needed a break, and a chance to go back over what I'd written and formulate new ideas. So, here you go… a **_**real**_** ending for this story! And no, it probably won't be happening in **_**this**_** chapter.**

**Also, I'm not going to change my chronology or ages just because RIB suck at maintaining continuity. For my purposes, Blaine is still roughly a year older than Kurt. In other stories I'll go with the canon, but this was started long before they screwed with Blaine's age and I want there to at least be continuity within what I've written!**

Being at Dalton was overwhelming, even if it was only for a visit as his family worked at packing up his things. With a school full of teenaged boys, there was a ridiculous amount of noise and confusion that Blaine wasn't fully prepared to process. It had only been a little more than a month since his attack; while the headaches were finally gone, trying to focus on anything for too long still exhausted him.

"Are you okay?" Blaine turned towards Kurt as he heard the boy speaking to him. Blaine only knew that it was Kurt because the younger boy had come to sit with him since Blaine couldn't go up to his dorm room himself because of the stairs. There was an elevator somewhere, of course, but it was just easier on everyone for Blaine to camp out on a couch on the ground floor of the building where someone could keep an eye on him while his parents worked on his room.

"Just tired… there's too much going on, and I think the batteries are starting to die," Blaine replied, reaching up towards his hearing aids with his right hand. While he had gotten a new, less restrictive cast on his broken arm, Blaine was still struggling with tasks that required him to use his left arm as well. Everyone just seemed to assume that it was a product of the brain damage that had compromised his motor skills, something that would get better with time as he was able to actually work on it in his sessions with the physical therapist.

"Too much background noise?" Blaine nodded. "We don't have to talk, if it's tiring you out. We can just sit here… I'm just happy to be able to sit here and hold your hand."

"I miss being able to just talk to you… to not have to worry about whether or not my hearing-aid batteries are going to die on me or if it's going to be too loud in the room for me to be able to understand what you're saying. And I miss not having to try to read people's lips just so that I can make sure that I'm not missing something vital, even though I suck at it and I just end up making things harder on myself than I really have to most of the time. I miss being able to hear and understand my own voice. And I miss being able to sing without making everyone in the vicinity plug their ears…"

"You don't sound that bad."

"You're just being nice, Kurt. I miss hearing your voice… _really_ hearing it, the way you actually sound and not the bastardized version of it I get through these stupid things." Blaine closed his eyes as he felt Kurt starting to play with his hair. "I want my life back, Kurt. My memories, all of it. I want things to be normal again."

"I know. But I think at this point you have to learn to accept what happened to you and figure out how to move on with your life." Blaine sighed.

"I know that's what I need to do… but I'm having a really hard time understanding why this all has to be so _unfair_. I didn't do anything to those boys. They didn't even know who I was, except for Karofsky…"

"He was there?" Kurt asked. Blaine had forgotten that he hadn't filled Kurt in on all of the details of the things he had begun to remember, including the fact that he had seen the football player that night.

"At the gas station, before… I don't know if he was here, at Dalton. I don't remember that much of the actual attack. But he was with them, before I got here."

"Then he was probably with them when they attacked you…" Kurt began.

"There were four of them… but I only remember three of them actually hurting me. He may not have been responsible…"

"Blaine, if he was with them, he's just as culpable as they are because he didn't stop them! Please tell me you gave the police his name…"

"I didn't remember at the time," Blaine replied. "And I never saw him, Kurt… there's no way for them to prove that he actually did anything to me. Or that he even came to Dalton with them." Blaine did his best to straighten up so that he could turn to look at Kurt. "I told them I saw him at the gas station, but not when I was being attacked, after I remembered."

"He wasn't arrested, was he?" Blaine shook his head.

"There's no proof… they arrested the three I could identify. I guess none of them would tell who the fourth guy was. I don't know many of the details about the investigation, okay? I don't really want to know them. I'm… I'm afraid that if I know the details it will only make things worse. That there might be some details they left out to spare me the pain of having to remember. And I know it's stupid, because my mom told me everything they knew after I woke up. But… I'm not sure I _want _to know if there's anything else missing from that night."

"You don't want to remember?"

"Why would anyone want to remember something like that, Kurt? It would be so much easier if I could just skip this whole year, not remember anything until all of it's over and I can move on with my life."

"Forgetting a whole year won't help you get over this, Blaine."

"It would make my life so much easier if it did. If I didn't have to remember and deal with all of this."

"We wouldn't be together now if this hadn't happened… your memory loss took away every reason why you didn't think it was a good idea to be with me. Every single thing that stood in the way of our getting together went away when you couldn't remember me and you were forced to rely on your gut feelings about everyone in your life."

"But there's still so much missing, Kurt… no matter how much I love being able to say that you're mine, it doesn't replace all of the memories that are gone and that I don't think I'm going to be able to get back. I don't remember the day we met. I remember bits and pieces of getting coffee with you, but I'm pretty sure it's not all from the same day. I don't even remember going to McKinley to talk to Karofsky with you… I only know that happened because _you_ told me after the police started asking questions about that day." Blaine closed his eyes as Kurt leaned over and pressed a kiss against his lips.

"I know you're upset, okay? But you shouldn't focus on the bad things or the things you miss about the way your life used to be… it isn't going to help anything."

"It's hard not to focus on that… I'm forced to deal with parts of it every day. And I'll have to keep dealing with all of it for the rest of my life. It's only going to get worse as I get older, and one day I won't be able to hear anything at all no matter how much it's amplified."

"And by then, I'm sure they'll have come up with some fantastic solution that will make it easier for you to hear. They already have all sorts of implantable devices that help people with profound hearing loss… or we could always learn sign language. And you're learning to read lips…"

"I'm tired, Kurt. I'm so tired of being forced to adapt. And I don't know how much longer I can keep doing this."


	19. Options

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: Another chapter down… not sure exactly where I'm going with this one, but I'll figure it out soon enough. I'll definitely get through the trial, but other than that I'm really not sure where I want to end up.**

Blaine had grown to hate the hearing aids that he was pretty much forced to use in order to communicate with anyone. They ate through batteries too quickly – his audiologist explained that it was because they were extremely powerful – and he knew that at times other people could hear feedback coming from them because of how high they had to be turned for Blaine to hear and understand what people said to him. Not to mention that he could occasionally hear it himself, if there was any kind of interference.

"I think it's too early to be thinking about any kind of serious intervention… Blaine, you've barely had a chance to get used to your hearing aids. You need to give them more time." Blaine closed his eyes and shook his head at his mother's comments. She said the same thing every time he brought up the subject, but Blaine was determined that he would at least see what his audiologist had to say on the subject.

"Mrs. Anderson, if we're going to try any of the implantable devices it will be easier for Blaine to adapt if we can install it sooner rather than later. The neural pathways that were associated with his hearing will adapt to other functions as he loses more and more of his ability to hear, and it will make it harder for Blaine to adapt to any kind of implanted device in the future. Given his current hearing loss, an implanted device could be his best option in the long run."

"So you agree with him?" Blaine's mother replied.

"If Blaine is willing to go through the surgery, it's definitely something that should be considered. I can't guarantee that this would work any better than the hearing aids, and a cochlear implant would destroy any residual hearing on that side," the doctor replied.

"If it didn't work, I would be screwed," Blaine commented.

"I would only implant one side in your case, at least until we know how well it works. Most likely the left, because you seem to have less hearing on that side already. And you're still losing hearing… I'm not sure how much longer you'll have any residual hearing to work with."

"We'll need to discuss this…" Blaine bit down on his bottom lip at his mother's comment.

"Of course." Blaine closed his eyes as the man started digging through his desk. "I have information here that you should read through and discuss before you make any decision… it will give you all the information you need to consider. For now, though, I do want to go ahead and make some adjustments to the programming in Blaine's hearing aids, to see if we can improve the sound quality for him." Blaine nodded, taking the devices off and passing them over to the doctor. While he hated the hearing aids, he wasn't a big fan of the silence that came whenever he took the devices off.

It didn't take long for the doctor to pass the devices back, and Blaine's mother immediately started to help him put them back on until Blaine swatted her hand away. "I can do it." Blaine winced as turning on the devices caused a moment of brief feedback, which thankfully went away as he adjusted the dial on the back of the device.

"Better?" Blaine shrugged; truthfully, what he heard was about the same as it had been before the doctor had made his adjustments. Things still weren't as loud as they should have been, and the soft noises that

"We should give it some time, see how it works in different environments. If we need to, we can make changes in a couple of weeks at your next appointment." Blaine nodded. "Unless you have something else we need to talk about, I'll see you in two weeks. And I should have the FM system we ordered for Blaine by then."

There was a tense silence between Blaine and his mother as they drove back towards home. Blaine knew that his mother wasn't exactly thrilled about the idea of Blaine having more surgery when it wasn't medically necessary. But Blaine was terrified by the thought of not being able to understand anything people might say to him; he was desperate for some kind of guaranteed solution that would at least _help_ him understand, even if it wasn't perfect.

"You really want to talk about cochlear implants?"

"I don't want to risk losing all of my hearing and not being able to understand anyone I love…"

"There's always sign language…" his mother began.

"And everyone I know or might ever know would have to learn how to sign for me, or I'd have to completely rely on reading lips for the rest of my life. Which I'm not good at, in case you haven't noticed."

"You just need practice."

"Mom… I want to be able to _hear_. Even if it's not completely real, even if it's just a mechanical, computerized voice for the rest of my life… I'd rather have that, and be able to understand people even if I'll never be able to hear your actual voices again. I… I don't want to be constantly waiting for my hearing to be gone completely, not when I have a choice."

"We don't even know that this _is_ a choice, Blaine…"

"But we won't know if we don't look into it. If I don't _ask_ for it, if they don't do the tests to see if it's even an option. You heard what he said… the longer we wait, the harder it will be to make this work. And I _want_ this to work…"

"We _all_ want this to work, Blaine. We want you to be alright again just as much as you want things to go back to the way they were. I just don't think that you should put too much faith into this idea before you know for sure that this is going to be an option. If they do this surgery and it doesn't work, you'll be completely deaf. You won't have any other options to think about."

"I need to give this a shot. I have to try _something_."

"We'll talk about it. I just don't think it's a good idea for you to get your hopes up too high before we have all of the details here…"

"I know. I'm trying not to put too much faith in it. But I need to know whether or not this is going to work for me, whether or not I have a chance. I'm going to have enough regrets in my life already, without constantly wondering whether or not I might have had a chance to have a life that's at least somewhat normal after all of this."

"We'll talk about it tonight, when your dad gets home." Blaine closed his eyes, wondering exactly what his mother would say to his father before Blaine got a chance to talk to him. Blaine didn't even realize that he'd fallen asleep until he felt his mother gently shaking his shoulder. "Come on… you should get inside and put your foot up again, try to get some rest."

"All I ever do is rest. And I don't see why I still have to keep my foot up all the time. I've been in this cast for six weeks already. Surely my leg has healed enough that I can walk on it now…"

"But the doctor said eight weeks, minimum. And until that cast comes off, it's my job to make sure that you're following his orders so that you don't end up causing long-term damage."


	20. Trials

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: I was very close to uploading this chapter without an author's note, as it is currently almost 2 AM. And I'm wide awake (too much sweet tea and soda today thanks to work). But yeah… here's another chapter.**

Kurt was nervous, although it was mostly for his boyfriend's sake. He didn't have to testify, and so he was sitting in the gallery to listen to what the other boy had to say.

If he was being honest, Kurt thought it was ridiculous that the lawyers were forcing Blaine to testify. Kurt had been with Blaine the night before, when the prosecutor had tested the FM system with him in the courtroom, and it hadn't gone that well. If the woman got too far away from where Blaine was seated, the sound quality diminished to the point that Blaine couldn't understand what she was saying. If she got too close, feedback from the system interfered with his comprehension.

From his place in the audience, Kurt could _see_ the frustration on his boyfriend's face. The prosecutor had already finished questioning him, and the defense attorney wasn't as careful about positioning in the room to make sure that Blaine could hear his questions.

"I'm sorry… I can't understand what you're saying…" Kurt couldn't help but shoot the defense attorney an evil look as the man moved even further away from Blaine, not bothering to _look_ at the boy as he spoke.

"Do you need me to rephrase the question?"

"Sir, I can't hear you… I need you to look at me, and I need you to move closer for the transmitter to work." Kurt couldn't help but smile slightly at Blaine's answer, even though Blaine hadn't heard the man's actual question. Kurt watched as the man did what Blaine suggested, although the man moved too close before he repeated himself.

"You stated that you experienced amnesia following the incident… how can you be sure that the defendants are, in fact, your attackers?" the man asked. At least he was close enough that Blaine could read his lips to some extent.

"I started remembering _before_ I spoke to the police. The faces were there, even if I didn't know their names. I… I didn't want to see them, in the yearbook. I wanted it to just be a random attack. But I _saw_ their faces that night, and then again in the McKinley yearbook."

"But you had seen those boys before." Kurt watched as Blaine shook his head.

"No… I hadn't."

"You'd been to McKinley before… surely you could have seen them while you were there?"

"I'd been to McKinley _once_ before. And I didn't even remember that… I _still_ don't remember ever being there."

"But you remembered David Karofsky…" Kurt watched the way Blaine shifted uncomfortably at the mention of that name, and he was confused.

"I can't explain why I remember him… he isn't exactly someone I want to remember. Kurt… Kurt told me that the one time we met, before that night, he pushed me into a fence and threatened me."

"He threatened you? You told the police that he threatened you?" the defense attorney asked.

"Of course… but I didn't see him on campus that night. I don't know if he was there or not."

"You don't know whether or not he was there… and yet you identified three attackers. Only three."

"There was a fourth voice, but I never saw who it came from. _They_ are the only ones that know who the other guy was."

"Did you see David Karofsky the night you were attacked?"

"Briefly, yes."

"Where?" Kurt could see that the defense attorney had thought of something, something that could prove to be dangerous.

"At the gas station, when I stopped on my way back to campus. Which I told the police when I remembered… I've given them everything I've remembered so far."

"But you didn't tell them _why_ David Karofsky threatened you, did you?"

"I don't remember why…" Blaine began.

"You don't remember… you don't remember confronting David Karofsky after he kissed your boyfriend, Kurt Hummel?" Kurt felt his jaw dropping to the floor as Blaine turned to look at him, confused. He had no idea where the man had gotten that information, but Kurt hadn't mentioned that to Blaine and he knew that it was going to be a shock.

"What?" Kurt bit down on his bottom lip as Blaine struggled to find words in response to the man's question. "I… I don't…"

"What? You didn't know that David Karofsky had kissed your boyfriend?"

"No…" Kurt closed his eyes as Blaine looked at him in confusion.

"Kurt Hummel didn't _mention_ that fact to you before the police showed up to speak to you? He didn't mention the fact that the defendants – all McKinley high school football players – had teased him mercilessly before he transferred to Dalton?" the man asked.

"No… I had no idea…"

"You expect this court to believe that your _boyfriend_ didn't tell you all of these things?"

"I was still trying to figure out who Kurt _was_… I didn't remember him when I woke up, and I'm still struggling to remember everyone. There are parts of my life that I don't think I'll _ever_ remember…"

"I think this would be a good time to adjourn for the day. We'll pick this back up tomorrow morning at 9 AM." Kurt waited until the jury was out of the room before he ran up to the witness box where Blaine was still seated.

"I'm sorry… I should have told you sooner. I just didn't think it mattered…"

"I… can we just go?" Kurt nodded in response to Blaine's question, holding out a hand to help the older boy up. "I just want to get out of here."

The ride back to the hotel Blaine and his mother were staying at was silent and slightly tense; Kurt didn't want to say anything that might upset his boyfriend, and it seemed as though the older boy didn't want to talk.

"I'm going to go pick up some dinner… anything specific you boys want to eat?" Mrs. Anderson asked.

"I'm not that hungry," Blaine commented as they pulled into a parking spot. Kurt got out of the backseat and opened Blaine's door, helping his boyfriend out of the car. Even though he was out of the massive cast, Kurt knew that Blaine still wasn't getting around that well thanks to the walking boot that his doctor had prescribed.

Kurt settled onto the bed next to Blaine in silence, watching the older boy close his eyes and start to cuddle up into Kurt's side. "You should take your hearing aids off if you're going to take a nap."

"I'm not going to take a nap. I… I'm just not sure what I'm supposed to do right now…" Kurt reached over and took Blaine's hand.

"Then do me a favor and just listen. When we first met, I was going through a really tough time. Karofsky was making my life _hell_… locker checks, dumpster dives. You name it, I was dealing with it. I showed up at Dalton to spy on the Warblers and I was _sure_ that you all were going to beat me up when you figured it out. But you, and Wes, and David were so nice to me. When you heard, we exchanged numbers and you told me that I didn't have to be the victim… that I should stand up for myself. So the next time it happened, I followed him into the locker room and started yelling at him, asking him what his problem was. And he kissed me."

"Kurt… I don't have to hear this…"

"You need to know, Blaine. If I had thought that they would _ever_ find out about Dave and that kiss, I would have told you before the trial started. I don't even know where they got that information…"

"We went to talk to him. To try and help him…" Blaine began. Kurt nodded.

"You just wanted to make sure he knew that he wasn't alone, but he took it as a threat and pushed you into a fence. And a few days later he threatened to kill me if I told anyone else what had happened. When my dad found out, he and Carole gave up their honeymoon to send me to Dalton, to protect me from Dave."

"And Dave is the reason we're together." Kurt raised an eyebrow. "If you hadn't come to Dalton, those boys never would have come after me. Who knows how long I would have had my head stuck up my ass if all of this hadn't happened."

"You would have figured it out eventually."

"And what if I hadn't?" Blaine asked.


	21. Verdict

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: And, another chapter down. I'm still not sure exactly where I'll be stopping with this, but I'll figure it out soon enough.**

Blaine was nervous. He knew that his testimony hadn't gone well; the defense attorney that questioned him had thrown him for a loop with all of the questions about Karofsky and Blaine wasn't sure if he'd handled it all that well. But he supposed that he would know soon enough, given the fact that he was sitting in the courtroom waiting for the jury to return with their verdict.

"I don't know if I can do this," Blaine whispered, leaning over closer to Kurt. He smiled slightly as the other boy squeezed his hand. Blaine understood why Kurt didn't speak; the judge was already in the courtroom, and Blaine didn't want Kurt to get in trouble. Blaine couldn't really hear what was going on; everyone was too far away, and Blaine wasn't close enough to attempt to read anyone's lips. He'd been working on that since he'd woken up in the hospital, but it was slow going and he still struggled with it.

Watching the boys that had attacked him was the only way Blaine could figure out to make sure that he knew what was going on; their reactions would have to be his first gauge of what happened. Blaine couldn't help but bite down on his bottom lip as he waited through all of the formal language that came before the verdict was read. He squeezed Kurt's hand as he saw what he _hoped_ were the signs that things had gone badly for the boys. Blaine was surprised when Kurt wrapped his arms around him and squeezed him tightly before he saw Kurt's smile.

"Conviction?" Blaine watched as Kurt nodded, smiling at him. For the first time since he had finished testifying, Blaine felt like he could breathe again despite the numb feeling that washed over him.

"Blaine?" Blaine felt Kurt turning his head so that he was looking at his boyfriend. "Are you okay? How are you feeling?"

"I… I feel numb…" Blaine could see the confusion on his boyfriend's face. "It's not sinking in yet that this is almost over. Can we just go back to the hotel now?"

"Just let me speak to the prosecutor, sweetie, and then we'll go." Blaine nodded in response to his mother's comment, smiling at Kurt.

"Sorry… I'm just not quite sure how to deal with all of this yet. I… I'm ready to be done with this part of things. I'm ready to get things back on track and get my life back. Or at least get somewhere close to that."

"I know… I wish that there was something I could do to make things better." Blaine smiled, squeezing the other boy's hand.

"You have no idea how much it helps just having you here next to me while I deal with all of this. I don't know that I would have been able to go through all of this without you. I'm… I'm so glad that you were there when I woke up, and that you weren't scared away by all of this," Blaine commented, motioning towards his ears.

"I would have been an awful person if I disappeared when you needed me the most… I never would have forgiven myself." Blaine glanced up as he felt his mother putting a hand on his shoulder.

"They're suggesting that you might want to speak at the sentencing hearing next week…"

"What do they want me to say? I told them everything they asked about here in the past week…"

"They want to make sure that the judge understands what's happened to you. And it might help you to face them…" Blaine shrugged.

"I'll think about it."

"Why don't we go back to the hotel so you can get some rest? It's been a long day, and I'm sure you could use some time to think about whether or not you want to say something to the judge."

By the time they got back to the hotel, Blaine had already started thinking about what he might say if he decided to speak. There wasn't a whole lot he could think of that hadn't already been mentioned at the actual trial, and to be completely honest Blaine wasn't sure if it was worth bothering.

"You're thinking about what you're going to say?" Kurt finally asked as they pulled into the parking lot. Blaine shrugged.

"I don't know… I don't know that I have anything I would want to say that they haven't already heard. Part of me just thinks that I should go back home this weekend, before they're sentenced. They don't… they don't need me for this, not really."

"Blaine… it'll give you some peace…"

"I already have peace… they're going to go away, and I have restraining orders preventing any of them from coming near me ever again. I don't need to be there when they're told how long they'll be in jail…" Blaine replied. "Besides, I'm supposed to have an appointment with the audiologist on Monday to see if a cochlear implant is even an option."

"That appointment can be rescheduled… you're only going to get one chance to speak to the court about all of this," Kurt replied. Blaine sighed, nodding slightly. "Maybe it would help if you tried to write out what you might say, if you choose to speak."

"We didn't bring the computer… my handwriting is still a mess…" Blaine began.

"So then I'll help you. I can finish up my homework tonight, and we'll have all day Saturday and Sunday to work on it. We can even go to Dalton for a while if you'd like, get you out of this hotel room. Besides, I'm not the only Warbler that chose not to go home for the break, so we have friends to hang out with."

"I shouldn't take up all of what's left of your break, Kurt… I feel bad enough that you've stayed here with me this whole time instead of going back to Lima to see your family."

"My family understands… they know that this is tough. I wanted to make sure that the boys who did this to you – the same boys that made my life _hell_ when I was at McKinley and who followed you because they hated something about you that you couldn't even control – were going to be put away for a long, long time. Because they couldn't stop hating what they didn't understand."

"And if I can't do this?"

"No one is going to force you to do anything, Blaine. But you should at least think about it."


	22. Surgery

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: And another chapter down. I apologize for posting two in a row; I had that last chapter written for a few days, and I forgot to post it for some reason…**

"Would you still love me, even if we had to learn sign language to communicate?" Kurt Hummel raised an eyebrow.

"Don't you think it's a little late to be asking that question?" Kurt asked, squeezing his boyfriend's hand. They were sitting in the waiting room at the hospital; Blaine would soon be going into surgery to get his first cochlear implant. "I'll gladly learn sign language for you. I've stuck with you this far, haven't I?"

"But it keeps getting more complicated…" Blaine began. Kurt could tell that he was worried about what this surgery was going to mean for him in the long run.

"What relationship doesn't get more complicated as time goes on? I'm not going to leave you just because things get a little hard, okay? I love you… that's the only thing that really matters here," Kurt replied, leaning over and pressing a quick kiss against Blaine's cheek. "After all, I drove all this way to be with you before and after this surgery. Do you really think that I would give up on you after I've spent so much of my time trying to prove to you that I don't care that you've lost your hearing?"

"I just… I can't help being insecure. I'm not the same guy I was when we met…"

"But you're the same guy you were when we started dating. I came into this relationship knowing that you might never be able to hear my voice again. Knowing that I would have to constantly worry about whether or not you heard what I was trying to tell you or if you understood me correctly. I'm okay with that. I'm okay with the thought that we might have to learn an entirely new language to communicate with one another.

"I just feel like I'm not going to be good enough for you… that you deserve something better."

"I don't want anything else. I don't want anyone else." Kurt watched as Blaine nodded slightly, closing his eyes and leaning his head against Kurt's shoulder. Kurt reached up with one of his hands and started playing with his boyfriend's curls, doing his best to help Blaine relax. He was mostly worried that Blaine was too stressed out and nervous about what was about to happen.

"Blaine Anderson?" Kurt gently shook the other boy, smiling slightly at the other boy as they got up and followed the nurse and Blaine's mother back into a small room. "We'll have you go ahead and get into the hospital gown. You'll need to take everything else off, including the brace." Kurt watched as Blaine started to change.

"Do you want me to wait outside?" Kurt asked, starting back towards the door as the nurse closed it behind her. He stopped when Blaine shook his head.

"Don't leave me…" Kurt nodded, smiling at his boyfriend as Blaine sat down on the bed to remove his shoe and the walking boot he was still wearing. Soon the boy was sitting on the edge of the bed while Mrs. Anderson gathered up his clothes and tucked them away in the bag she'd brought to the hospital.

"Nervous?" Kurt asked, perching next to Blaine. The boy nodded silently as Kurt took his hand and squeezed it gently. "You're going to be fine… you survived being beaten and left for dead in the middle of February. This is minor surgery, nothing like what you've already been through."

"They have to shave part of my head…" Blaine began.

"It'll grow back."

"I'm not sure about this… I'm scared." Kurt smiled, leaning in and pressing a kiss against Blaine's lips before the boy could say anything else about being afraid.

"Just think about how amazing it's going to be in a few weeks when they turn it on, though… if this works, you're going to be able to hear so much better. This is a big deal." Kurt pressed a kiss against the back of Blaine's hand as the nurse walked back into the room.

"Nervous?" she asked, walking over towards the bed. Blaine nodded. "Don't worry… you're in good hands. This'll all be over before you know it." Kurt was thankful that the woman didn't seem at all upset over his obvious display of affection towards his boyfriend. "I'm going to start your IV, and give you something to help you relax." Kurt continued holding Blaine's hand as the woman tied the rubber tubing around the boy's other arm and searched for a vein.

"Hey… look at me," Kurt said, turning Blaine so that he wasn't looking at the needle going in. Kurt knew that the older boy hated needles, and he really didn't want Blaine to flinch and make the nurse miss the vein she was going for. It would only make things worse in the end. "You're almost there, okay? In a few hours, you'll be back home resting and recovering, and in a month or so they'll turn it on and we'll find out whether or not it works." Kurt watched as his boyfriend nodded.

"Alright… I've got you all set up with your IV. I'm going to go ahead and give you something to help you relax, and then in a few minutes someone will be here to take you up to surgery."

The last few minutes before they took Blaine into surgery were pretty much silent; Kurt watched as the older boy slowly leaned back into the bed and started to close his eyes. "Whatever she gave him is working…" Mrs. Anderson commented as Blaine's hand slipped out of Kurt's. Kurt nodded, reaching up to turn off the hearing aids and take them out.

"You should probably take these… once he's out, he's out," Kurt replied.

"I'm worried… he was out for so long the last time he had surgery."

"But he'd just been badly injured then. He'll be okay this time." Kurt smiled at the woman, hoping that he was right; he'd been nervous for the same reason, but he hadn't wanted to say anything.

Once Blaine had been taken off to surgery, Kurt and Mrs. Anderson went back to the waiting room to wait. The surgery itself wasn't that long; two hours later, they were lead back into the recovery room. "He's starting to wake up… it's going to be another hour or so before you can take him home, but everything went well," the nurse commented as they walked.

"But he's okay?" Mrs. Anderson asked.

"He's fine. We haven't been able to really communicate with him just yet… I'm assuming that you have his hearing aids?"

"Yes… we assumed they wouldn't need them once he was asleep. We just need the right one, correct?"

"That's right… he can't hear anything on the left side, even with a hearing aid. What little hearing he had left was destroyed when they implanted the device. If the device doesn't work for him, he'll be left with just what hearing he has in his right ear."

Kurt quit paying attention to the conversation as the nurse pulled back a curtain to where Blaine seemed to still be sleeping. He immediately walked over, ignoring the bandage that covered the left side of Blaine's skull as he put the hearing aid back into the boy's right ear. He smiled as Blaine groaned and woke up, looking at him for a brief moment.

"Hey…"

"It hurts…" Blaine whispered. Kurt nodded.

"I know… but you did so well. I'll see what they can do about the pain," he replied. Kurt looked over at the nurse.

"I'll be back in just a minute with something for him." Kurt turned back to Blaine and smiled.

"I'm so excited for you… this is such a big deal." Kurt leaned in and pressed a kiss against Blaine's lips. "I love you so much."

"Love you… thank you."

"For what?" Kurt asked.

"Telling me to do this."

"Don't thank me until we know how this is going to work."


	23. Turning On

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So I apologize if this chapter is either A) boring or B) not detailed enough. As I am neither deaf nor hard of hearing, I've never actually been to an audiologist – I got the details from a lot of research and watching a lot of YouTube videos of people having their implants turned on, plus a little from conversations with one of my cousins whose daughter was implanted at two. I'm actually kind of fascinated by this stuff…**

Once again, Blaine was nervous. He'd spent a little more than a month waiting for this day, and het he was still a little terrified that the implant wasn't going to work. It didn't help that Alex had brought him to the audiologist to have the device turned on and to have his first mapping appointment to program the processor.

Having the device attached to the side of his head was awkward; Blaine really wasn't sure what the magnet would feel like before the doctor held it up to the device. The part that rested on his ear just felt like a larger version of his old hearing aid. Blaine played with the wire as it was hooked up to the computer.

The worst part for Blaine was how much of a struggle it was for him to hear everything that was going on before the implant was turned on. He really wasn't sure what to expect, and the first time he heard a beep on the left side he couldn't help but jump.

"You heard the beep?" Blaine nodded, reaching up towards the device. "It's strange?"

"I wasn't expecting that…" The rest of the beeps weren't as much of a shock; by the time they were done with the mapping part of the appointment, Blaine was really sick of the beeping.

"Are you ready?" Blaine nodded, turning to look at Alex as his brother turned on the video camera that the older boy had insisted on bringing.

"I can't believe you're filming this…" Blaine raised an eyebrow as the microphone turned on. The first thing he heard was a high-pitched whistle, which slowly died down. "I don't hear anything…" Blaine began; even with the hearing aid in his right ear, it still wasn't enough for Blaine to understand what the audiologist was saying without trying to read her lips. He waited, rather impatiently, as she slowly turned it up until Blaine started to recognize that there was actually _sound_ coming through his left ear for the first time in over a month. It was faint, but it was definitely there.

"How's the volume?" Blaine recognized that the audiologist was speaking to him, even if he was still struggling to understand what she was saying.

"It's too quiet… I can't really understand what you're saying…" Blaine glanced over at his brother, watching the look of concern on the older boy's face. Slowly sounds started to fade in as the device was turned up, until he could hear the audiologist's voice. It didn't make complete sense, but he could _hear_ something. "I hear your voice… it's too quiet to understand, but I hear it."

It took a few moments, but eventually Blaine could clearly make out that she was counting every time she turned the volume up slightly. It sounded… strange. "Is it supposed to be that high-pitched? It sounds like I'm in a cartoon…"

"That's normal. It'll adjust as you get used to having the device turned on."

"Can you hear me?" Blaine turned a little too quickly at the sound of his brother's voice, making the older boy laugh. "You looked like Dug just then…"

"Squirrel!" Blaine couldn't help making a joke out of his own reactions; everyone in the room laughed, surprising Blaine with just how _loud_ it could be.

"It's loud?" the audiologist asked once they had all stopped laughing at the Disney reference. Blaine nodded.

"The laughter was… but I think I just wasn't expecting it. When you talk, it isn't that loud."

"Let me know when it gets to a comfortable level. I'll set that as level one on your processor, and then we'll have the other levels set successively higher so you can adjust the levels as you get used to them." Blaine nodded, listening as she began slowly turning up the volume and talking to him until it was kind of loud, but not to the point that it was uncomfortable.

"Yeah… I think I like this setting…" Blaine began.

"Okay… I'm going to unhook you and set the programming on your processor, and then once we get that set up I'll show you how to change the settings and we'll go over everything."

"I don't really want you to turn it off." Blaine watched as the woman smiled at him.

"That's good… the more you keep the device on and the more you work on speech and comprehension, the faster you'll start to get used to the device and the more you'll understand without having to read lips." Blaine nodded as the woman reached up and took the magnet off the side of his head, removing the microphone from behind his ear and setting up the device that he would actually be taking home with him.

It was only a minute or two later that the doctor handed over the device, indicating that Blaine should put the device on himself. It was awkward at first; Blaine had a hard time getting the magnet to attach to the side of his head, and the processor didn't want to stay behind his ear. But finally he got it all settled with the doctor's help and they turned it on. The high-pitched whistle was back for a moment, until it settled down and Blaine could hear noises again.

"How does that sound?"

"Still weird."

"It's going to be strange for a little while… just keep the device turned on as much as possible, try to have people talk to you as much as possible. And keep on top of the speech therapy and homework."

The rest of the appointment was spent going over the various pieces of equipment that came along with the processor, learning how to change the programs, how to fix some of the common problems with the device, and talking about his speech therapy and future mapping appointments.

It wasn't until they were on their way out of the doctor's appointment, long after the video camera was turned off, that the full magnitude of what had just happened hit Blaine. It was the sound of the birds chirping, of the cars driving past the office, of the _wind_ – everything Blaine had taken for granted before he'd been attacked and everything he hadn't even realized that he had missed when his hearing was gone. Blaine stopped, just listening to all of the sounds of the world that he could suddenly recognize again.

"What?" Blaine couldn't help but smile at Alex's voice; it kind of reminded him of Kurt, when the boy got really excited and even more high-pitched than normal. Not at all what Alex normally sounded like. "What, do I sound funny?"

"Everything sounds funny. It's just… it's weird, hearing all of these things." Blaine winced as a car honked its horn out on the street. "That was kind of loud. It's like I hear all of these weird things, but I don't really hear words yet… I know when you're talking to me, even if you aren't looking at me, but I don't think I would understand what you're saying without the hearing aid and reading your lips."

"That's what all of the work you still need to do is for." Blaine nodded.

"Think I'll be able to talk to Kurt on the phone by my birthday?" Blaine asked.

"I think you're determined enough to make that happen."


	24. Celebrations

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: And so another chapter has been finished; I actually really like this chapter, despite the fact that it's pretty much primarily used to set up the next (and what I hope will be the final!) chapter. Yes I actually have a pre-planned ending for this story (gasp!). So yeah, enjoy!**

Kurt really wasn't sure what to expect as he knocked on the door of the Anderson house. He'd been texting and IMing with Blaine the whole time they had been apart, but being told what was going on with the older boy's hearing was a lot different than actually _seeing_ how well Blaine was doing. Blaine seemed excited enough about his progress when they chatted, but given what Blaine was used to pretty much any improvement was a big deal.

"Kurt! I'm glad you made it. Blaine is going to be so excited to see you…" Claire Anderson commented, rushing out of the door and wrapping Kurt in a quick hug.

"I'm excited to be here… are you going to let me in?" Kurt asked, smiling. He wasn't all that surprised when Claire pulled him into the house, leaving his bag on the front porch.

"I guess _I'll_ get his bag," Alex commented, walking past them as Claire continued to hurry Kurt through the house.

"He's still struggling with speech, but as long as you keep looking at him when you talk he's okay. And try to reassure him that everything's okay, that it's fine that he still isn't ready to talk to you on the phone."

"Wait… what?"

"He had this whole plan that he was going to call you today while you were on the way here. But he's been working his ass off for three weeks and he's still not quite there… the whole speech recognition thing is a little tougher than he expected it to be," Claire replied.

"But he's okay with that, right? He's not upset?"

"Of course he's upset. But he's taking it pretty well, considering." Kurt nodded, putting a smile on his face as they approached Blaine's door.

"Thanks, Claire… I think I can take it from here." Kurt knocked on the bedroom door, hoping that Blaine would actually be able to hear it. As soon as the door opened, Kurt smiled and leaned against the frame. "Happy Birthday."

"Thank you," Blaine replied with a smile. "Will you help me?"

"With what?"

"I need you to talk to me… tell me about the Warblers, whatever." Kurt raised an eyebrow, a little confused. "I have to try to understand what people are saying with _just_ the implant. No hearing aid, no lip reading. And the more new voices I have to deal with, the better. So I need you to talk to me." Kurt smiled, nodding and taking the boy's hand.

"I can do that. Does it need to be a conversation, or do I just need to talk to you?"

"Conversation is better… that way you can correct me if I misunderstand what you're saying," Blaine replied. Kurt nodded again, leading the boy over to his bed and sitting down with him. He watched as Blaine took off the hearing aid that he still needed on his right side.

"What does it sound like?" Kurt asked, not waiting for Blaine to look at him again.

"Weird. Voices were chipmunk-y at first, but they're getting better. Higher voices like yours still sound cartoon-ish." Kurt smiled.

"I don't sound like a Chipette, do I?"

"A what?"

"A Chipette… the chipmunk's girlfriends…" The look of confusion on Blaine's face didn't go away. "Brittany, Jeanette, and Eleanor?"

"Oh… no. No, more like Theodore." Kurt couldn't help but laughing at his boyfriend's description.

"Do other things sound different?"

"At first, background noise was really loud and kind of bad. I couldn't understand people talking at all until they turned on the noise reduction at my second appointment. I got so used to silence that I jumped a lot the first few days when I heard noises. It's gotten better, but alarms still scare me. And Claire's cell phone ringer is too loud."

"You hear her cell phone?"

"Only the ring… her nightstand is right on the other side of the wall," Blaine replied, tapping the wall next to his bed.

"You're doing really well…" Kurt commented, smiling at his boyfriend. "How much of it is you cheating and reading my lips?"

"I'm getting good at making educated guesses about what I'm hearing. But I am sneaking peeks at your lips to make sure that I understand…" Blaine admitted. Kurt shook his head, turning around so that Blaine couldn't see his face. "Not fair…"

"This is what you need me to do. You'll never learn if you cheat." Kurt wasn't that surprised by the way Blaine hesitated before he responded.

"It's not cheating… most of the time I'm going to be able to lip-read, too."

"Not on the phone."

"I'm still not even convinced that I'm going to be able to use the telephone anyway… that's the only time I really won't be able to read lips." Kurt turned towards Blaine at the comment.

"Even when you don't know what I'm saying, you still managed to have an answer to my comment," Kurt commented with a smile. He leaned in and pressed a kiss against Blaine's lips. "And you _will_ be able to talk on the phone again. I believe in you. Next school year, we'll be able to talk at night before we go to bed while you're at Dalton and I'm at McKinley." Kurt watched as a confused look crossed Blaine's face.

"What…?"

"My parents can't afford another year of tuition, and since Dave's family is moving he won't be around anymore… not to mention that all of the other boys involved in what happened to you are going to be in jail until you're finishing college."

"But… will you be safe?" The older boy looked terrified at the idea that something might happen to Kurt.

"I'll be fine. My stepbrother and all of the guys in glee are going to have my back… trust me, my parents already talked all of this out with all of my friends from McKinley. It's going to work out." Kurt was a little shocked at the tears that were sliding down Blaine's face. "Blaine… what's wrong?" When the boy didn't respond immediately, Kurt turned Blaine's head to face him. "What's wrong?"

"I don't want anything to happen to you… it's bad enough that this happened to me, and I don't want you to go through this, too. It's _hell_, Kurt. I just wish that I could protect you…" Kurt leaned in and pressed another kiss against Blaine's lips.

"Nothing is going to happen to me. Everything will be fine, okay?" Kurt watched as the boy nodded, smiling and picking up Blaine's hearing aid to help him put it back on. "Dry those tears, and we'll go downstairs to start celebrating with your family, okay? It's your eighteenth birthday."

"So… after the party, will you take me somewhere?" Kurt raised an eyebrow. "It's nothing weird or dangerous, I promise. I just want to go buy a lottery ticket."

"A lottery ticket? _Really_?" Kurt laughed as Blaine shrugged.

"I figure that my good luck won't last forever… I should take advantage of it while I can." 

"Good luck?" Kurt asked.

"I survived having the shit beaten out of me by four Neanderthals. There was only about a fifty-fifty chance that this implant thing would work, and it _does_. This is about as close as I'm going to get to a lucky streak…" Kurt smiled.

"Okay. After the party, we'll go buy you a lottery ticket. But I draw the line at tobacco products, because those are horrible for you."

"Deal."


	25. Birthday Presents

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Glee or any of these characters… if I did, Karofsky wouldn't exist anymore, Jesse wouldn't have been such an asshole (albeit one I believe legitimately fell for Rachel), and there would be a LOT more Blaine.

**A/n: So… are you ready? Because this chapter is sappily sweet in more than one place. It's also the last chapter. I'm ready to move on from this one… plus I don't want to leave you all hanging waiting for the ending while I'm gone to California (sadly nowhere near any Glee cast members, as I will be in the San Francisco/San Jose area).**

Blaine hadn't expected his birthday to be a big deal; with everything that had happened, he had really just expected a nice meal and a cake with his family in Kurt. But somewhere along the line it had changed, and by the time Blaine and Kurt arrived downstairs Blaine was nearly scared out of his skin when half a dozen Warblers jumped out from behind various pieces of furniture.

"I didn't know about this… I swear," Kurt commented, rubbing Blaine's back as the other guys rushed over to hug him.

"What are you guys doing here?"

"Alex called us," Wes replied.

"He said your birthday party was today, and we all decided that we would follow Kurt out here and surprise you," David added.

"Besides, after the YouTube video he sent all of us, we had to see it for ourselves." Blaine raised an eyebrow at Nick's comment.

"YouTube video?"

"Nick! You guys weren't supposed to tell him about that!" Blaine looked over at his brother, who looked annoyed. "Thanks for ruining that part of his birthday present."

"I'm still confused… what are you talking about?" Blaine let Alex lead him into the dining room, where Alex's laptop was set up and already open. Alex pushed him towards a chair that was set directly in front of the computer.

"This is something I made for you. It was going to be my final project for my film class, but I realized that there was no way it was going to get done in time. What I had didn't feel complete… I needed to film some stuff when I got home for the summer."

"I thought you were just being obnoxious with that stupid camera," Blaine replied. He smiled as Alex rolled his eyes and started the video.

"Just watch the video."

Blaine turned back to the computer, laughing over some of the pictures and video clips Alex had strung together from their childhood. "Some of these things should _never_ be seen by the general public…" Blaine began.

"Well, it's a little too late for that… it's been up for a week."

"_This is my little brother, Blaine. He drives me crazy at times, but I love him_." Blaine smiled at the narration as he read it. There were pictures of Alex and Blaine together in high school, from before Blaine transferred to Dalton, as well as a couple of Blaine and his Dalton friends. "_His freshman year, he came out. Our family all still loved him, but the other kids at school were awful. They bullied him mercilessly, and even beat him up for going to a school dance with another guy. He wasn't safe, so our parents let him transfer to a boarding school a few hours away. He was safe._"

Blaine smiled at a picture of him and Kurt, taken a couple of days before he was attacked, which was followed by pictures from various Warblers events. "_He even made friends… great friends, who knew that he was gay and just didn't care. He joined the show choir, and he was awesome. I was so proud._" Blaine watched as the pictures faded, and Alex appeared on the screen. "_One night Blaine was driving back to school late after going out to dinner for our little sister's birthday. He ran into a few guys, and somehow they knew that he was gay. They followed him back to school, and they nearly beat him to death_." Blaine bit down on his bottom lip, fighting back the tears as he was reminded about what had happened.

"_I've never understood how people could hate something so much that they would think it was okay to hurt someone just because they were different. Blaine never did anything to those guys, but they put him in a coma. When he woke up, he couldn't hear anything, he couldn't remember most of his friends. There were so many things about Blaine's life that had to change. Some of his memories came back, but not all of them. His hearing didn't._"

Blaine really couldn't stop the tears from coming as it cut into video Alex had shot the day they'd turned on his implant. "_Last month, Blaine got a cochlear implant. At first it was hard, because the implant took away what little hearing he had left in his left ear. But the day they turned on his implant, it was kind of like my brother got back a huge part of what had been missing since he was attacked._" Blaine smiled as he heard the conversation from that day coming over the speakers.

"_Usually it's the younger brother that looks up to the older one. But in this case, it's my little brother that's the hero._" Blaine looked up at his brother, smiling.

"Thank you…" Blaine began.

"Wait until you see the comments… there are so many of them. And they're all so supportive and awesome."

"You guys all knew about this?" Blaine asked, looking around at everyone else in the room.

"We've been spreading the link around… it's gotten kind of huge," Wes replied.

"We didn't really expect it to get so far. But people seem to love it…" Thad added.

"Why don't we break out the pizzas? I know that some of you boys are going to have to go home, and I'm sure you'll all want to have lots of cake, too." Blaine looked up at his mother's words, a little surprised that the whole party had been planned out so well behind his back.

The whole party was a blur for Blaine; while it was good for him to know what being in a loud, crowded environment was like as far as how the implant would work, it was a little disorienting to have so much background noise all the time, even with the noise filtering function turned on. He spent most of the time sitting next to Kurt, just trying to _listen_ to his friends. He didn't say a whole lot, mostly because it was hard for him to keep track of a conversation when there were so many of them going on.

"You look tired." Blaine smiled at Kurt's comment as several of the boys walked out of the house, heading to their own homes. Only a couple of them – Nick and Jeff – had decided to stay the night because they lived too far away; both boys were only in town because they had been staying with other friends since school got out the week before.

"It's hard, trying to listen when there are so many different conversations going on. I'll be fine, now that things have calmed down," Blaine replied. "I'm glad you guys did this, though. It means a lot to me… I've missed being around everyone at Dalton."

"I actually didn't have anything to do with it. I mean, I knew about the video, and that Alex was going to show it to you for your birthday. But I didn't know about the party with all of the guys coming over."

"Or that it would turn into a slumber party?"

"I kind of figured when Nick and Jeff were here that they might end up staying. I think Jeff takes Nick to the airport tomorrow morning on the way home… but I'm staying all weekend, provided your parents don't get sick of me."

"I don't think we'll ever get sick of you, honey," Mrs. Anderson commented. Blaine couldn't help but laugh at the way his boyfriend turned bright red. "Trust me… you're part of this family now. I don't think any of us would ever want to get rid of you after what's happened over the past few months."


End file.
